A Wish Among Stars
by Dunno12345
Summary: Bellarke One-shots. Requests accepted.
1. Mirror Mirror: Part One

**Okay, so because I have little self-control when it comes to writing fanfiction, I decided to make one-shots. Of Bellarke. This will have no particular updating time-as if I ever have one-and will consist of my own ideas and the requests people have. But I've had this idea for awhile, but didn't want to write a whole fanfiction revolving around it so, I present: Bellarke one-shots. Please review! Ideas are also welcome. (This first shot will be a mini-series.)**

I became aware of a light breeze, rustling my hair, disturbing the small clutches of grass at my feet. Sunlight bled from the sky, rich and sweet. It cascaded in a curtain and formed a pool of gold in the cupped valley I stood before. The hill wasn't much, but it was enough. From this vantage point, I could make out the tower of Polis. It punched through the thick knot of trees to the west like a triumphant fist.

I tried to remember how I'd gotten here, but my memories were broken and murky. I thought I recalled Arkadia, but it was as far off as Polis. As unreachable as a dream. For all I know, it had been one.

"I bet you're feeling pretty confused," a friendly voice came from behind me.

I went perfectly still.

The blood in my veins stopped flowing. I couldn't even hear my own heartbeat.

 _No._ That was my first thought. Because it was impossible. My ribs tightened around me like ropes, squeezing all the breath from my lungs. Slowly, I turned around.

Familiar brown eyes met mine. His hair was the same length, but it seemed longer, twining around his neck from underneath a faded beanie. His hands were in his pockets and his lips wore a lazy smirk, as if this was a casual meeting. As if he weren't dead.

"Finn?" I whispered. The word barely held any sound as I stared at this boy. But it couldn't be. Finn was gone, wiped from this world with nothing more to show for it than the blood that had been on my hands. But blood washed with water. Ashes faded away.

He smiled at me. "In the flesh. Well," he shrugged. "Sort of."

I gaped at him, wide-eyed. The wind dried out my mouth, but I couldn't seem to close it. "H-how-" my voice caught. "How are you here?"

Finn took a step forward and on instinct, I took a step back. This wasn't right. None of this was right. "You're dead," I said aloud, as if he didn't know.

But if this bothered him, he didn't let on. He rolled back and forth on his heels, his expression thoughtful. "Last I checked."

The world spun. Polis changed positions, moving from the west to east. My legs threatened to buckle under me. "What's going on?" I asked, and I could hear the panic there, tasting of pennies from where I'd bitten my tongue. "Am I dead?" That was the only thing that made sense, and even that seemed unlikely. Was Heaven known for being a carbon-copy of the world only the deceased recognized?

"Now don't go getting your braid in a twist, Princess," Finn said, and he took another step forward. When I fell back another step, he raised his palms to me. His voice turned gentle. "I'm not going to hurt you," he told me as he stepped forward again. I hesitated, hearing his final words echoing back to me through the haze. _Thanks, Princess._

As if reading my mind, Finn took another step. "It's _me_ , Clarke."

I shook my head. Blinked. Waited for him to vanish on the air.

He didn't.

"No," I breathed. And then, louder, "No!" I stumbled back, but my foot caught on a stone in the grass and I lost my balance. I toppled back but before I could hit the ground, arms were around me, keeping me from colliding with the dirt.

Finn was suddenly very close, staring into my eyes. What little air had been left in me was gone now. I had no choice but to take him in. No choice but to acknowledge what every instinct in me was pushing me to believe and this time, I didn't try to move away. Because his arms were around me. Because they were _real_. Tangible. They were as I remembered, as were his eyes, before all the blood and death had leeched the light from them. He was the boy I'd known him to be. The one who had refused to wear his harness as the dropship came down. The one who'd crafted me a double-headed deer out of a scrap of metal.

"You're . . . " the wind snatched away my words. I took a breath. "You're . . . here. You're really here."

Finn grinned widely at me, tilting his head slightly to the side. "Welcome to the City of Light, Princess."


	2. Mirror Mirror: Part Two

**So I believe Jaha saw his dead "friend" only because the chip has him "downloaded" to the City of Light. But in these shots, I'm having the chip able to interface with its inhabitants memories. Oh, and I'd be lying if I said I didn't do a dance after that last episode. Bellarke is coming. Our ship is on the horizon.**

I didn't understand what was happening. It was too incredible. Too impossible. Something deep inside me, burrowed in my heart-or maybe it was my soul- told me it was wrong. Finn was dead. I'd felt the life leave him. I'd been the one to take it, and I knew that. But seeing him in front of me, alive and smiling, I suddenly didn't know what to believe anymore.

"The City of Light," I repeated, tasting it for myself. Maybe it was in my imagination, but I thought my mouth filled with the sweet tang of honey. Finn helped stabilize me and pulled away, but he still kept close by.

"W-What is that is that?" I asked in a breathy voice. " _Where_ is it?"

Finn glanced around, that grin never leaving his face. "It's here."

I followed his gaze, to the wild terrain surrounding us. "Here?" I asked. "There's nothing here." Nothing beyond the trees and the grass and the distant outline of Polis striking upwards. Nothing except insanity.

Finn's grin widened and he opened his arms at his sides like the metal bird I remembered, dangling from a chain. "What? You don't care for the view? I thought you'd like it here."

"I do," I countered hurriedly, not wanting to offend him. Each minute he was feeling less and less like a memory and more real. I wanted to cry. Maybe I already was. I was screaming in my head. "I just . . . I don't understand this." I tried to keep myself calm. "Any of it. How you're here. How _I'm_ here."

Finn didn't partake in my vexation. He simply stood a foot or so from me, looking appreciative with that gleam of mischief in his eyes. "What do you remember?"

I tried to channel everything I was feeling into my concentration, trying to grab on to those fleeting, fragmented images that broke into smaller pieces the moment I touched them. It was like trying to hold on to water.

"I think . . ." I looked down at my wrists. They were bare, but there was a ghostly weight around them, biting into the skin. "I think my hands were bound."

Finn tucked a flyaway hair of mine behind my ear. It was difficult to think when I was still struggling to wrap my mind around the fact that he was here.

"Why?" he asked in a quiet voice.

I snatched at the pictures flashing through my mind. "There was a chair, I think. And people and they . . . made me take something." I pinched the bridge of my nose, a flare of frustration running through me, but it was muted, gone in the next instant. "I don't know." I shook my head. "I really don't know. I can't feel anything anymore." I could feel the breeze and the warmth of the sun melting through my shirt. But the pain, if there had been any to begin with, was gone. And I felt like a person who'd been through a lot of it.

I wanted to get angry at the poor quality of my memory, but the emotion wouldn't come. Had it ever been there to begin with?

"Is it that important to you?" Finn asked, raising his eyebrows expectantly. A loose strand of hair tickled his jaw.

I stared at him, perplexed by the question. "What?"

"Does it really matter how you're here? You're here. That's what's important."

I opened my mouth. Closed it. Opened it again. "Of course it matters. Finn, you were gone and now you're here with me, and that doesn't make sense. I . . . " My heart clenched, but not with its usual ache. The ache was gone, belying my next words. "I killed you, don't you remember? I took a knife and-"

I was cut off by his hand grabbing mine. He raised it to him and held it against his chest. "I look pretty good for a dead guy, don't you think?"

I drew in a breath, but said nothing. I felt the soft linen of his grey shirt. Heard the steady pound of his heart, like it was inching up to meet me.

"This doesn't make any sense," I repeated. He died, my head tried to convince me. I felt the phantom pain buried so far inside me. How I'd gotten here was a mystery, but I remembered Finn dying. I remembered the wetness on my hands as I pulled out the blade. Remembered clawing at my skin until my blood mixed with his.

But I could feel him now. I was hearing his voice, as real as the sun and the sky and the dirt sifting under my heels. Could it be that those memories I had were just some part of a terrible nightmare?

I looked up, meeting his amber eyes. "I killed you," I whispered again. "Didn't I?"

Finn's fingers tightened over mine. "You saved me, Clarke."

 _I saved him._ I flipped the words over in my mind, again and again. _I saved him._ Did I? Those images didn't feel like saving. They felt like ending.

I took my hand back and used it to massage my temples, easing a headache that wasn't there. How could I be afraid without feeling fear? There was a peace in my body and mind, coaxing me to relax. To accept this strange, impossible world. And I wanted to listen. I didn't like the questions I kept feeling compelled to ask Finn when I could've just been grateful that he was here at all.

But there was a nagging, tapping at me from the base of my skull. A feeling of wrongness when I looked at Finn.

As if reading my mind, Finn grabbed my hand again. He held it tightly. "Want to go someplace else?" he asked, blinking up at the sky.

I looked ahead of us, towards the stretch of valley. "Where's there to go?"

"Pessimistic, as usual," he said, cracking another smile. "Glad some things never change."

"I don't see any horses." Or any other means of transportation for that matter.

Finn scoffed. He tugged the lips of his beanie down lower with one hand. "You don't need horses," he said. "You just need this." He tapped a finger against my forehead. "Now I'm going to show you a little trick." A wink. "It's kind of awesome."

That wrongness doubled, but it was squandered almost instantly. A pressure built at the back of my skull, like the nagging was being smothered. "What sort of trick?" I asked dubiously.

Finn wiggled his fingers in front of me. "Close your eyes."

Uneasily, I obliged.

"Now, picture a place you'd like to be. Doesn't matter where. You can think of the Ark if you'd like, but that's hardly very creative and I don't mean to be presumptuous, but I doubt it would be your first choice."

He was right. I didn't want to swap the sunlight for the stars. I'd gone long enough without it. Instead, I painted an old image behind my lids, recalling even the smallest of details. The broken scraps of metal and wood. The voices. The strong scent of pine edged with a metallic smell that clung to the air.

"And," Finn's voice was just by my ear, breath moving my hair just so. "Open your eyes."

I did, and I was standing exactly where I wanted to, at camp. Not Camp Jaha, or the camp Arkadia it had become. But the One Hundred's camp, constructed around the dropship that first took us to the ground. It was all the same, save for the thrum of life that had been cut. It was quiet and that silence now made it feel foreign. Other than myself and Finn, it was empty, like a body without a heart.

"Huh," Finn marveled, as he took in the camp. "Not bad. Not the most pleasant of places, but you definitely could've chosen worse."

I started for it in slow, small steps. It was surreal. I could hear the ghost of footfalls running by me. The points of tents spearing the sky. I could smell the bonfire that was now reduced to a pit of ash and rock. If I stopped and listened hard enough, I could just make out the laughter that once lingered around the stone circle.

For a long while, this had been home. No other place had made me feel quite like this one had. No other place had given me a sense of hope, had fueled the belief that we could rebuild the world. Yet all we'd managed to do since then was tear it further down.

"Where is everyone?" I asked, though I knew what a ludicrous question that was. They were either elsewhere or dead. Buried at Arkadia or buried here.

Finn let out a long sigh, looking towards the dropship door. The broken curtain of plastic swayed in the wind. "Who do you want to see?"

Everyone, I wanted to answer. I wanted to see everyone. I wanted this camp and its people back. I wanted to believe we could build things again, instead of make what little was left crumble even more.

A face flashed through my mind.

Finn nodded at something over my shoulder and I followed his eyes. Not something. _Someone._ For the second time today, I lost the ability to breathe. I felt a smile on my lips, but the nagging in my head wouldn't let me unleash the full force of it.

Wells smiled at me, wetting his lips as if bashful. Nervous.

I hesitated for only a moment this time. And then I tugged him towards me, as real as Finn, and hugged him. The wrongness pounded, but I dismissed it. Whether this was a dream or not, I was beginning to lose interest in caring. I gave myself a second to appreciate this, whatever it was and as impossible as it seemed. The people I had thought were gone forever were here. They were here, with me.

For this moment in time, I agreed with Finn: The rest didn't matter.


	3. Mirror Mirror: Part Three

**Oh gosh, I really hope the show does something with the City of Light and Clarke. Please review!**

The sense of wrongness mounted like a wave inside me as I smiled at Wells. My dead best friend. But was he really dead? I swiveled around to face Finn again, still standing with his hands in his pockets, the epitome of calm.

"What about Charlotte?" I asked. I glanced back at Wells, waiting for some kind of reaction at the mention of the little girl who had taken his life from him. But there was nothing. No sign he'd even heard me.

Finn smiled again, but this time, the smile made me uncomfortable. The wrongness pounded like a drum near the base of my skull. "Why don't you ask her yourself?"

And suddenly she was there, between Wells and Finn, exactly as I remembered. Braided hair. Oversized jacket. I'd forgotten that her eyes were brown.

She gave me a small smile and I noticed how that haunting look I'd always glimpsed in her had faded. She looked like the person I'd always imagined her to be, before her parents were floated. She looked like a kid.

"Hi, Clarke," she said in her sweet voice, waving her hand a little. She pursed her lips, glancing from the ground to me, like she was unsure of what to do. I walked over and came down to her height. I placed a hand on her jacketed shoulder, as real as Wells and Finn.

The last time I'd seen her, she was propelling herself off a cliff to the lethal rocks far below. No one knew that the I'd tried looking for her body the next day, but it had been too late; the ocean had claimed her by then.

"I didn't know if you'd want to see me," she said meekly.

Didn't want to see her? Did that mean everything happened the way I thought it did?

I pulled her to me, enough for a brief embrace. When I let go, I kept my hands on her shoulders, and stared into her eyes. "Charlotte, what happened?" I asked, as gently as I could manage. That pressure returned, trying to squander the nagging. I pushed through it, nodding to her in encouragement. "You can tell me. I just want to know how you're here."

She shrugged a shoulder, casting a look at either side of her, first at Finn and then at Wells, as if asking for approval. Her eyes found mine again. "I came because you called me."

That only made me more confused, and I studied this little girl before me. How could someone who felt and looked so real feel so wrong? Dream and reality mixed together, churning until I couldn't distinguish one from the other.

I took a breath, and forced myself to focus. The nagging had left when I'd told it to. When I was content with seeing Wells, seemingly alive. But now something was bothering me about it. I wondered why Finn wasn't asking about Raven; why Wells wasn't asking me about his father.

As if on cue, both the boys took a step forward, and the question that was in my head came abruptly from their mouths.

"How's Raven been?" asked Finn, but his expression remained unchanged.

"How's my father, Clarke?" inquired Wells.

I stood from my hunched position, and stared at them with parted lips and furrowed brows. The wrongness worsened, until it was like my heart had taken up residency in my head. _Thump, thump, thump._

Yes, something was very, very wrong.

I looked back at Charlotte. "Do you remember anything, Charlotte?" I asked, the desperation leaking into my voice, but it was gone in an instant, as if I no longer understood what it was like to be desperate. It felt false and a million miles away, like the ground to the stars. "Do you remember what you did?"

Again, Charlotte looked over at the others before turning back to me. "What I did?"

"To Wells." The pressure intensified. My head felt weighted by a stone like my mind was moments away from sinking through my body.

Charlotte's expression turned confused and she tried taking a step back, but I hung on, invigorated by their strange behavior. "Do you remember the knife? Do you remember killing him, Charlotte? You killed him, because his father floated your parents. Do you remember your parents?"

"Stop!" Charlotte suddenly screamed, tearing from my grasp. Before I could take another step, Finn was in front of me. His hands found my shoulders. "Stop it, Clarke," he told me. "You're scaring her."

Scaring her? How could I scare someone who showed no signs of fear? What even was fear? Was it worse than pain? Or was its cut just as deep?

I gazed back at Finn, my heartbeat and the wrongness pounding in unison. Thump, thump, thump.

"Something's not right, Finn," I told him, but I still couldn't get as frustrated as I wanted. Could barely stir the fire I knew was buried somewhere inside. "I need to know what's going on."

He took my face in his hands, palms warm from their time spent in his pockets. He stared at me, so close I could see the flecks of grey in his irises. His voice became soft. "Everything's fine, Clarke. You are in the City of Light."

"I know, but what is that?"

"It's a place where there's no pain," chirped Charlotte, who seemed to have forgotten our previous conflict.

Finn nodded. "That's right. Why don't we try going somewhere else, Clarke? Think of the first thing that comes to mind. I know you're unsure, but that's normal. I know it feels strange, but that's normal, too. You just have to find the right person to explain it to you."

I tried to pull away from him, but Finn didn't let me go. "What do you mean the right person?" I asked, hating how stinted my feelings were. I wanted to be panicked. I wanted to be afraid. But there was nothing beyond the pounding and the odd pressure and Finn's hands on me.

"The person," Finn spoke slowly. "That you want to stay for."

"What?"

"I want you to think of a time when you were truly happy," he told me, his thumbs brushing over my cheekbones. They were as callused as I remembered. "When you weren't sad or grieving over something or someone. The last time you felt truly safe. I want you to picture it. Picture how you felt. I need you to do that."

The last time I'd felt safe. I didn't want to think about it, because it was too far behind me. The nagging doubled, and with it the pressure until I was sure my skull would split apart. I pressed my hands to the crown of my head, but whether that was to think or catch the broken shards of bone if if my skull did shatter, I couldn't tell.

When was safe? What was safe? I shut my eyes against the malign throbbing, letting my mind the reigns. It was too painful to do anything else. I didn't know what I was looking for, and followed my instincts instead. It took me a moment but slowly, I became aware of what was happening around me.

I listened as the distant singing of birds disappeared, replaced by a hollow hum. The sunlight filtering through the trees vanished. The feeling of unruly earth solidified into hard metal. The wind went still.

I peeled my eyes back, having to squint in the sudden dimness. It felt both foreign and familiar. It was the same place, but I didn't feel like the same person. The artificial glow of circadian lights illuminated the small apartment. A circular window was embellished in the wall to my left, holding an ocean of stars. How many times had I sat in front of that window, drawing a shadowed earth suspended in the dark?

From the other room, I thought I heard voices. Whistling. It drifted down the hall and I was suddenly hit with recognition. It was a football game. Recorded, playing on the projector. I glanced sideways at Finn, waiting for him to follow after me. I didn't trust him, but the concept of being alone here didn't make me feel any better.

Finn didn't follow me. He just shook his head, smiled, and told me to go. He motioned for me to go down the hall and hesitantly, I listened. The apartment was just as we'd left it, but I caught the details I'd forgotten. The slight slant in the flooring. How strange my equillibrium was, as if we hadn't gotten it exactly right. The scuff marks on the counter from where Dad forgot to put a coaster.

I froze, suddenly scared to continue. Now I knew why I was here. I knew why my instincts had dragged me back to this orbiting world in space. The last time I'd felt safe? There was only one person that ever truly made me feel like we could do the impossible. That we could be better.

I picked up my pace, nearly running down the small corridor and to the entertainment room. The screen was on, but the room was empty. I stared at the vacant couch, feeling as disappointed as this strange place would allow me to feel. But Finn had come. And Wells and Charlotte, when I'd thought of them. Why not this time? Why not-

"There you are," someone said from behind me.

I didn't move, too afraid to disturb the sound. Too afraid it would crumble if I took the wrong step. I knew that voice anywhere. I'd heard it spoken over me about tales of space and stars. Of the ground. I'd gone to sleep hearing it muffled through the walls. I'd heard it whisper soft hymns to chase away the particularly bad nightmares, arms like a shield around me.

Safe wasn't a place, I realized. Safe was a person.

I turned towards the voice and if this world allowed me to cry, I knew I would be. "Dad?" I choked.

My father stood by the corridor I'd just come from, leaning against the wall with a mug of steaming tea. Mint, I knew. His favorite. His dirty blond hair fell across his forehead. His blue eyes-my eyes- sparkled under the lights.

The nagging pounded, but I couldn't listen to it anymore. Not here. Not when my Dad was speaking to me. I barely even registered the pain in my head.

Dad smiled and my heart squeezed at the sight. "I've been waiting for you," he said. He opened his arms.

And just like that, without a moment's hesitation, I once again banished the nagging from my mind.

This time it did not come back.


	4. Mirror Mirror: Part Four

**Excuse me as I do a little happy dance because I really like this idea. Considering that I only have one more part after this one, I will take other requests.**

I lost the ability to speak. To form very thoughts, beyond three simple words: _He was here._ My dad, after I'd watched him being thrown into an airlock chamber. After I'd watched him disappear into the stars. He was here, standing in front of me.

My body moved without my volition and suddenly, I was in his arms. Years fell from me until I felt like a little kid again. Before war and the death it came with. Before I'd become something I could no longer recognize. With my dad, I was just Clarke again.

Dad pulled back just enough to look at me. His gaze roved over my face, like he was trying to commit it to memory. "It's been a long time, Sweetie," he said, smiling.

I nodded. Gave a small, shaky laugh. "Yeah, it has." I gripped him harder, worried he would slip through my fingers and disappear any second. "I can't believe you're with me."

He wound a thumb around one of my curls. "There's no place I'd rather be."

I hugged him again, until I was sure the force would shatter me. No matter; I felt more together now than I had in a very long time. "I missed you," I said, and it came out as a choked whisper.

Dad mussed the crown of my head with one hand and rubbed my back in a comforting circle with the other. He smelled just as I remembered, like his tea and old cotton.

Maybe this world did allow for tears, because one slipped out. "I watched the guards take you away," I murmured. "I watched Jaha seal you into the chamber and then you were just . . . gone." I pressed my face into his shoulder. "They took you from me."

His hand movements didn't cease as he hugged me tighter. "Only for a little while," he said. "But we're here now. You can ask me anything you want." I heard a smile in his voice. "We have all the time in the world to catch up."

 _All the time in the world . . ._

I finally detached myself from him long enough to meet those blue eyes again. They were like patches of sky. "Is this-" My voice broke. "Is this place real? Because I remember you dying, Dad. How can you be here when I remember that?"

Dad exhaled, long and contemplative. His rubbing moved from my back to my shoulders. "Because you're still holding onto those memories and you don't have to. You can just let them go."

That should've seemed impossible, or at the very least strange, but the nagging in my head was gone, along with that foreign pressure. I didn't want to think about him disappearing into the void of space every time I looked at him. I wanted my dad as he was now; alive, and with me.

"How am I supposed to do that?" I asked quietly. Perhaps if I were able to, I'd feel ashamed for wanting to forget. But the sensation never revealed itself. My cheeks didn't flush.

I stared up at my dad, waiting.

"You stop trying to figure all of this out," he said. "I know you like to understand things, Clarke. But this place is meant to take pain away. You have to let it."

"But how?" It came out as a plea.

"You're still holding on. To who or what. To everything that brought you to the City of Light. You have to be here, in this moment. Your past can't hurt you. Nothing can. You have to believe that."

I shook my head. My voice trembled, though I felt no sadness stirring within me. "I don't want to remember," I admitted.

Dad squeezed my shoulders. "Then don't."

* * *

We talked. About everything and nothing. We watched archaic football footage and threw popcorn at the losing team. We ate impossible things I'd never known to exist on the Ark. But all I'd have to do was think of it, and it would appear, like magic.

Meanwhile, Dad had spoken the truth. Over time, the images that plagued me grew less and less vivid, losing color like they'd been washed one too many times. Some paled completely, until I could no longer tell what it once was. But there were a few that still lingered, with stains so grisly, they refused to wash out.

"You should've been there," I told dad one day, after our team had lost its second game. Popcorn littered the floor under the screen. I lounged on the couch as he sat in the chair beside me. "With Mom. when she came to the ground. You were the one that discovered the truth about the Ark. You deserved to see the ground."

"Show it to me, then," said Dad, smiling from behind his cup of tea. "It's not too late."

So I did.

I closed my eyes and painted a glorious sky above us. I recalled the light breeze and the great pines that chattered where the wind swept through its branches. I thought of the ocean; an endless stretch of water that shown like opal. I remembered how the waves were calm in the mornings yet swelled and writhed at dusk, as restless and all-consuming as the ocean of space high overhead. I pictured the sun in its plunge behind the snow-capped mountains. It lit the clouds on fire and colored the horizon a brilliant orange.

I opened my eyes, and it was exactly that. Except my dad was here this time, finally able to see the home we were able to reach because of him.

I grinned.

His lips were parted in surprise and he gawked at the scene before us. His eyes drifted upwards and he turned in a slow circle. He spread his arms and laughed, the sound richer than the failing sun.

This was how it should've been.

No-this was how it was.

"So," he said, his voice breathy. He beamed at me. "This is Earth."

"Yeah, Dad," I said, as the ugliness of the previous memory finally lost its color and dulled into an image I couldn't make out. "This is Earth."

* * *

My hair smelt of salt. The locks were stiff from the water, but I didn't care. I'd always wanted to see the ocean with my father and that's just what I'd done. After a grueling water fight, we sat on the shore, the sun trapped in a perpetual state of descent. I didn't want this day to end, so it didn't.

Dad laid on the ground next to me, arms pillowing his head. I sat up with my legs crossed. My finger scrawled through the wet sand, depicting an image of my Dad's smiling face.

"Clarke."

For a moment, I thought it was Dad who had spoken and I looked down at him. But he was still staring up at the sky, unbothered. I returned to my drawing.

"Clarke."

Now I knew someone had spoken to me and I looked over my shoulder. There, standing on a rocky part of shore, was someone familiar. I both recognized him and didn't recognize him, like a very old memory I couldn't quite recall the wholeness of.

Unkempt brown curls fell over his forehead. His eyes were a dark, rustic color, set on high cheekbones dusted in freckles. He wore regular clothes-a white t-shirt and cargo pants. Nothing out of the ordinary.

I studied him as he stood there, just a few meters from me. A look of what appeared to be relief shown on his face, but it was chased away in the next instant, by a look of desperation. "Clarke, it's me," he said.

I felt my brows knit in confusion and flicked off the layer of sand that had collected over my finger. I looked back at my Dad who was sitting up on a shoulder, watching me.

I returned my gaze to the man. "Who?"

His dark eyes went blank, face relaxing in momentary surprise. Then something else flooded into his face. Fear. "Clarke, it's _me._ Bellamy."

Bellamy. That name churned up old images that had settled deep inside me like silt. Memories flashed through my mind, of smiles and choices. I felt the weight of a lever pressing into my palm.

Oh. Right. How could I forget?

I abruptly stood up. "Of course," I said, swiping my hands over my pants. It was pointless, as they were covered in sand, too. "Bellamy."

Now that I realized who he was, I had expected him to be happy to see me. It felt like a while since we'd last spoken and I was prepared to ask him why he was here; if he had died. Death didn't bother me like it once had.

But his mouth wasn't full of hello's like mine. His was full of something else, spoken in a worried voice I couldn't understand. "You can't stay here, Clarke," he told me. That desperation in his eyes mounted, until the intensity threatened to brand my skin.

His next words came out more gently, but that didn't soften their effect. On the contrary, they shook me to my core.

"This isn't real," said Bellamy.


	5. Mirror Mirror: Part Five

**I lied; this will have six parts. Not all one-shots will be this long. I just really wanted to do this idea. Anyway, please review!**

I was quiet for a long moment, as I stared back at this boy. At least I remembered him more clearly now. Sitting around a fire pit, aiming a gun at a fabricated target. The smirks. The glares. The smiles that had become fewer and fewer until they'd turned into something of a rarity.

I looked between my Dad and him. "What?" I asked in a small voice. "I don't understand."

Bellamy took a small step forward. He gestured to the picture-perfect scene around us. "All this, Clarke. It isn't real. It's in your head."

I felt the vexation on my face. The orange of the sun made Bellamy's hair glow, crowning his head in a halo of light. "What . . . what are you talking about?" I asked. I almost laughed. I waited for him to.

But when the seriousness never left his eyes, my confusion doubled. He moved towards me slowly, like I was an animal he was worried he would frighten off. "I'm talking about this place," he poke clearly. He cast a glance at my father, but made no other sign he'd even acknowledged him. "Where you're standing. You're not actually here, Clarke. You swallowed something. A chip. It messes with a person's head."

I faltered back a step. Suddenly, Bellamy felt more like a stranger than someone I knew. Than someone I recalled trusting with my life on more than one occasion. "You're wrong," was what I said and I gleaned strength from voicing it aloud. I dug my heels into the broken sand. The pounding at the base of my skull resumed for the first time in what could only be forever.

Like all the other times, I ignored it. "This is real, Bellamy. I'm here, by the ocean. I'm with my Dad."

"Your Dad is dead," Bellamy said simply. There was a note of sadness in his gruff voice, but he didn't take back the words. He didn't apologize for having said them at all.

I shook my head. "No. No he's not. I was wrong, he's fine. He's right here!" I motioned to my father still lying supine on the shore. He was looking back at Bellamy, the sparkle in his sky eyes gone. There was a warning there now. Something dangerous. Something I didn't recognize.

"Clarke." I looked back at Bellamy. "Jake Griffin was floated on the Ark for treason. You know that."

But I didn't. I had no memory of it. There was a dull imprint, but it was lenticular and indecipherable. Just a shadow chasing me around my head. "No," I told him. "No, he's fine. Everyone's fine, Bellamy! Finn and Wells and Charlotte. You remember Charlotte, right?" To help, I mentally beckoned her, and she materialized at my side in the same red jacket and heavy boots I'd left her in.

I looked from her to Bellamy and a pained expression crossed over his face as he glanced at Charlotte. The girl we hadn't been able to save.

Bellamy drew a foot closer. "She's not real, Clarke."

I was getting tired of this. Phantom fear lingered somewhere inside me, in sync with the nagging, and I wanted both gone.

To demonstrate, I grabbed Charlotte by the shoulders and thrust her out to him. "Look! I'm touching her, Bellamy! I can touch her. Don't you see that?"

But he didn't come to feel the realness of her himself. He kept his eyes on me, perpetually fastened to mine. "Charlotte died," Bellamy said, each word slow and clear. "She killed herself to protect us. She's gone."

I shook my head and stumbled. I willed Charlotte away and she went without complaint. "Dad," I looked at him. "Why aren't you saying anything? Help me convince him that you're real."

Automatically, my father stood up. He was taller than Bellamy, but Bellamy's shoulders were broader. Dad came up beside me and stopped. "I think it's time you went on your way," he said, that warning still there, in his face and in his voice.

Bellamy didn't move. He raised his chin higher, Sunlight washed over his face, turning his eyes from russet to amber. "I'm not going anywhere. Not without Clarke."

"I think he's right," I said suddenly, surprising even myself. But I realized how much I agreed with my Dad. Bellamy wasn't here to join me. He was only here to make me afraid. "I think you should go."

I thought I saw a glimpse of hurt in Bellamy's gaze, but it hardened over the next instant, resolved. "Do you want to know where you really are?" he asked, and there was an edge in his voice, sharpened by his words. "You're not by the beach, Clarke. You're lying unconscious in Arkadia, waiting to have the chip removed."

"Then why hasn't it been already?" I challenged, gratified by this discrepancy.

"Because Abby can't take it out while your're in this place. It could cause cognitive damage. She could wind up _trapping_ you here instead."

"Fine," I told him, my voice piquing just slightly. "Tell her to. I don't care, Bellamy. For once I'm happy. I'm actually happy. Why do you want to ruin that?"

"I don't," he said, deflating. "I want you happy, Clarke. But not like this. You can't have real happiness in a fake world."

"It's real enough."

"Not for you it isn't."

I shook my head again. My hands clenched and even though the nails dug into the palms, I couldn't feel it. "Just go, Bellamy," I told him.

"Clarke-"

"Go!" The single word exploded from me. "I don't want you here."

But he wasn't listening. Bellamy came up to me, no longer caring about being gentle. He was never good at that. "I don't care what you want," he said, grabbing onto my arms and staring into my eyes. That desperation grew more clear. We were close enough now for me to clearly see the beads of sweat adorning his forehead. He grabbed my arms. "This could kill you, Clarke!"

I scoffed, but there was no humor in it. Embers from the dying sun danced in his eyes. "Maybe I'm already dead," I murmured, closing my eyes.

Bellamy's hand went under my jaw and he raised it, forcing me to look at him again. "You're not dead. You're alive. And you'll see that if you just come back with me."

At the mention of leaving this place again, my sanctity, I recoiled away from him. His touch under my chin disappeared. I wanted him to vanish. I thought it, but unlike all the others that listened, he didn't obey. He didn't comply to my thoughts.

I raised my head in defiance. "I'm not going anywhere with you."

Bellamy's jaw tightened, the muscle going taut. "That's not an option." He reached for me again.

I thought of my Dad. My defender, my hero. And just like that, he was behind Bellamy. He clamped a hand over his shoulder. "Don't touch her," my father said.

Bellamy tried to step out of his hold, but my Dad's hand didn't loosen. "Clarke,-" Bellamy started, but I shut my eyes. I wanted him gone. _Gone, gone, gone, gone._

There was a sound of strain and I opened my eyes in time to see my Dad launch himself at Bellamy, putting himself between me and him like a wall.

Bellamy hit the shore with a loud smack, but he flipped to the side just as my Dad pulled back a fist. He embedded it in the surface of the sand.

"Clarke!" Bellamy jumped to his feet, trying to look from my father to me. "You have to stop fighting me!"

"I'm not doing this!" I told him. If I could feel horror, I would, but emotions were mute.

"Yes you are!" he shouted. "The chip is trying to push me out! ALIE doesn't want you to leave!"

 _ALIE?_

My skull hammered.

From behind me, I heard the uproar of the waves, cheering on my father. I didn't want to look, but my eyes wouldn't stop watching the melee, playing out before me.

"Clarke, I know you!" Bellamy said, moving away from my father's advance and circling back to me. "You know this isn't real!"

"Stop saying that!"

My Dad wasn't enough to stop him. I needed more people. More.

A phalanx of people appeared at the edge of the shore, dawned in evening attire. _Mountain Men._ The title came from some lost part of me. Buried, but not gone.

Bellamy looked from them and his eyes widened. They started for him and he was close enough to me now to meet me in just a few strides. He latched onto my hands, thumbs pressing into my knuckles.

When I tried to pull away, he wouldn't let go. His fingers were strong and callused. Soft yet unyielding. "It's true," he told me. "And somewhere in that head of yours, you know it. But your mother is real. Octavia, Lincoln, all of our people are real." He raised a hand to cup the side of my face. "I'm real, Clarke. It's time to come back to us."

The Mountain Men were getting closer, shoes squelching in the damp sand.

I bit my lip until the tissue burst. "I can't."

Bellamy raised his other hand until my face was cradled in his palms. His wooded eyes blazed. "Yes you can, Clarke. You have to."

"Why?" I asked, this time in earnest. My skull was fissuring. I could practically feel the splinters of bone falling from my scalp.

The space between the Mountain Men and us grew slimmer and slimmer.

"Because we need you," he said. He wasn't looking at the approaching mass. He leaned down until his forehead was resting against mine. His eyes fluttered shut. "I need you, Clarke."

 _"I can't lose you, too."_

"I promise you, we'll be okay. We'll do it together."

 _"Together."_

The Mountain Men were directly behind him now, a row of sunken eyes above sallow cheeks meeting mine. I remembered them. I remembered killing them. And I'd forgotten. I didn't deserve to forget.

"You can do this, Clarke," whispered Bellamy.

They reached their hands out, pale fingers curling like tree roots.

"Come back," Bellamy said, just as the hands found him.

The pounding in my head grew blinding. My vision blackened at the edges, until I could no longer see Bellamy in front of me. His strong hands were torn out of mine.

 _Come back._


	6. Mirror Mirror: Part Six

**This is the last part and I am not a huge fan of it, but I think it's okay. Please give me any request scenes (nothing inappropriate or graphic) that you have! And season 4 has been renewed! *hugs self***

I awoke beneath a small sun. It swayed, tethered to a thin wire and dousing me in an artificial light. But then a head appeared, and the sun blinked out.

"Clarke?"

I recognized the feminine voice. But it was like an old memory I couldn't quite reclaim the pieces of. My eyes adjusted and I took in the older woman's pulled-back hair and kind, calculating eyes. On her other side was someone else. Bellamy. Worry was scratched through every surface of their faces. Worry for _me_ , I realized.

The woman's hand went to my forehead and she closed her eyes for a second, a look of peace and thankfulness on her face. Then she was back. "How do you feel, Clarke?" she asked.

My eyebrows knitted together. Confused, I wanted to say, but I couldn't seem to find my voice.

Her hand swept back the hair that was stuck to my forehead. "The chip was successfully removed," she said, and added, "It's out."

 _Chip? What-?_

 _"This isn't real. You swallowed something. A chip."_

I stilled. The sweat under her hand grew warm again, yet I felt cold on the inside.

I lurched upright, ignoring the brilliant pain that bloomed across my abdomen. Bandages rubbed from around my torso, but I wasn't thinking of it. My eyes were taking in the small, grey room. Warped fragments of metal clung to parts of the ceiling, where the brilliant, burning sky had just been.

My panic rose. "Where is he?" I asked. "Where's Dad?"

The woman's face softened. Or maybe it broke, as she and Bellamy tried to coax me to lie back down again. I didn't. "Honey," the woman started, the endearment startling me. I didn't like the hesitancy in her voice. "Your father was-" A breath. "He was never here," she said slowly. "It was an image. Manipulated by the chip."

My breathing grew more shallow and I shook my head, just as slow. "No," I murmured. "He was just here. Please." I looked at Bellamy, his brown eyes glazed. "Just tell me where he is."

The woman put a hand out to Bellamy. "Maybe you should give us a moment."

But he just slapped her hand out of the way. "Maybe _you_ should," he deadpanned. "Clarke-"

"Just tell me where he is!" I screamed, my voice echoing around the room. "He was here! You were there, you saw him for yourself!" I said to Bellamy. I wanted out of this place. Away from everything. I wanted the sky and the ocean back.

My breathing became sporadic and the heat in my abdomen worsened.

"The wound's reopened," the woman said, her previous worry back in its place. "Clarke, I need you to calm down."

Calm down? I couldn't calm down. It was like the world was collapsing, curling in on itself.

Strong hands clapped me on the arms. "Clarke, look at me," Bellamy instructed and I managed to force my eyes to him. His grip is firm, but not painful. "He's gone. Your Dad was never there. It was all a trick."

He said it in fragments, each one sharp, each one lacerating.

 _This isn't real._

"No," I said, but my voice didn't hold the same conviction it had just moments before. I remembered the Ark. Being on the Ark, when it was impossible. But it hadn't felt impossible there. It had felt limitless. Like a fairytale. Like a dream.

"No." The single word broke and my vision blurred. The fight in me diminished. Now I felt the pain, and it was worse than I remembered. Sharper. It lit every nerve of me on fire and I shattered.

Bellamy's hands didn't let me go. For a moment, he seemed just as scared and pained as me. And then he pulled me gently to him and I didn't resist. His arms went around my shoulders and I let them support me as I cried. For my Dad. For losing him again. For knowing that I'd never really had him back to begin with.

* * *

They said my memories would come back in time.

The chip had merely suppressed them. But being in the City of Light for as long as I had been-nearly a month-made it impossible to determine how long it would take for those memories to return.

I hated not knowing who I was speaking to. I hated having a history I couldn't recall and being cooped up in the medical bay didn't help matters. I only had what they told me. About the chip and a man called Titus, but it gave me a headache to think of. My eyes burned from earlier and I laid back on the cot, staring at the sky that wasn't there. The woman came and left, but Bellamy was there. If not in the room, than in the hall, taking my silence as anger.

Maybe I was angry at him. I wanted to be. But he was the only thing here that I knew. And it was hard to stay angry at the only thing that you knew.

When night came, the room grew eerie and spectral. The lights looked ghostly and I pictured the Mountain Men waiting for me in the dark.

I bound my arms around me, dismissing the ache from the incision area.

"You cold?" Bellamy asked from the opposite side of the room. He hadn't left, but he'd kept his distance. After crying, I'd told him to leave, yet he never strayed far.

"No," I murmured. I said nothing else.

But he came over with another blanket anyway. He draped it over me, avoiding my eyes. When there was no crease on the blanket left for him to smooth out, he finally looked at me. "I'm not going to apologize for getting you out of there, Clarke," he said.

"I know." And I did. I couldn't remember much of this world, but I remembered how bullheaded he was. He wasn't a man of many apologies.

Bellamy looked like he wanted to say more, but shook the words from his head. He went for another blanket and when I was about to protest about needing another, he spread it out on the floor instead.

I gave him a confused look. "What are you doing?"

He dropped down to his knees and stretched out on the floor. "What does it look like?" he asked. "I'm trying to get some sleep."

"Here?"

"Yeah, here."

"Why?"

He used his arms as a cushion. It looked hard and uncomfortable, but other than a few winces from his own bandaged incision, he made no complaints. He closed his eyes. His lashes were so long, they cast shadows over his cheekbones. "Because I'm used to it."

I raised my head higher and stared down at him. He didn't open his eyes. "You've done this before?" I asked, incredulous. Did he mean sleeping on the floor, or sleeping on _this_ floor? Why would he do either?

"Go to sleep, Clarke."

But I didn't listen. I kept my gaze on him until one of his eyes peeked open. "Since when?"

"Doesn't matter," he said, and closed his eyes again.

It was answer enough and my lips parted in shock. For weeks I'd been in the City of Light. And during that time he'd been . . .

Guilt dropped like a stone in my stomach. I'd been in my own world over there, completely oblivious to the pain this world still held. And this world could hold a lot.

I looked from him to my cot. It was probably more reasonable for him to just return to his own bed, but then I remembered the dark holding so many of my ghosts that I lost my nerve. "Bellamy," I said. "Come here."

He sighed, not opening his eyes. "I'm already here."

"No, up here," I clarified. "With me."

His eyes instantly opened and he met my gaze. "What?"

I pursed my lips and wiggled over as far as the small space would allow.

Bellamy didn't move, save for his eyebrows that rose up high. "Are you joking?"

I waited. But when he still made no indication of moving, I pulled the blankets from me and dropped one foot over the side of the cot.

Bellamy pulled himself into a sitting position. "What are you trying to do?"

"I don't want you on the floor, Bellamy. You could get sick."

"I haven't yet."

"Bellamy," I spoke his name with earnest, and he must've seen it, because the disbelief faded from his features. Opposed to when in the City of Light he hadn't listened to me once, Bellamy stood now and silently laid down on the limited spacing. Once settled, he tugged me down beside him, and readjusted the blankets. The coldness in the room disappeared. The shadows seemed farther away.

"There," Bellamy deadpanned, eyes on the ceiling.

The side of his body was pressed to mine. Arm to arm and leg to leg. The space was so narrow, but I didn't care. I liked this feeling, of having someone this close. And it felt right that that someone was him.

"I'm sorry, Bellamy," I said, speaking to the warped metal. "For leaving."

From the corner of my eye, he turned his face towards me. "C'mon, Clarke. It wasn't like you had a choice. It was the chip."

"No." I shook my head. "I'm not talking about the City of Light. I'm talking about before. I'm sorry I left the camp." I shifted to look at him, so close I could count the freckles on his cheeks. His eyes were as dark as space and equally interminable. "I'm sorry I left you."

His hand found mine from under the blanket and his fingers threaded through mine. The gesture was automatic. Natural. Like we'd done this a thousand times before.

"I've done things here, Clarke," he whispered, and I heard the shame in his voice. "Things you don't know about. Things you'll hate."

This time, I turned fully to him. His eyes shined and I tightened my grip on his hand. "I know you, Bellamy. I know who you are." I raised my free hand and pressed it to his cheek. "We've all made mistakes, and we've all done things we aren't proud of. You're not a bad man, Bellamy. You're just a good man who's done some bad things."

His lips pressed into a terse line and I swiped at one of his fallen tears, just as more came. He'd held me together and now it was my turn to do the same for him. He buried his face in my shoulder and wrapped his arms around my waist.

This was what we'd both needed; someone to understand. Someone to tell us it would be okay and to believe them. Or maybe it was more than that. Bellamy and I had been shattered over so many times. We were pieces of our former selves that now fit together seamlessly. He was what I wasn't. He knew me better than I knew myself, especially now. And I was struck with the knowledge that if he hadn't been the one to come for me, I wouldn't have come back. I'd have stayed in that fake world with the living dead. But not anymore. After everything I'd done. I'd left him behind again and again, but that would stop today. Right now.

I lowered my face to Bellamy's and pressed my lips against his forehead.

He stilled a moment before looking up. Those eyes. They held the world in them. Even if I remembered everything. Even if I remembered nothing, I trusted Bellamy to fill in the blanks.

I hesitated only a moment. Only enough to see that he wanted this as much as I did and then I gave in. I crushed my lips to his.

He returned it in the same instant, hungry and desperate. His arms tightened around me, dissolving the space between us.

I could hear the thrum of his heart beating against mine, so strong and relentless and undeniably _real._


	7. First Impressions

**So this is a series of first-impressions from Bellamy's point-of-view. Requests are accepted, and that's my formal way of saying: GIMME!**

Only one hand went up in the room. Eager and pompous. I didn't even have to look to know who that small hand belonged to; I already knew, just as everyone else in the small classroom did.

"Phytoplankton are the mass producers of oxygen on Earth, not trees," spoke Clarke Griffin, perfectly clear as if she were giving us one of her presentations. I always hated her presentations; the details were enough to put half the class to sleep and make the other half wish they were floated. Clarke took great care to exhaust every piece of information, which consequentially made every presentation unbearably long.

"Very good, Clarke," Professor Pike praised her and though she smiled and lowered her head, seemingly somewhat embarrassed at the attention, I could practically feel her satisfaction from my seat. All the way in the back.

I rolled my pencil between my fingers, annoyed.

I couldn't stand people like her, believing they were better because of their place on the Ark. As the last human beings in existence, I used to think each of us should've been treated equally. But that wasn't how it worked. Some of us were for security. Some of us were for labor, which made us the most disposable. And then there were people like Clarke Griffin; the privileged. Born with a silver spoon in her mouth and her nose perpetually raised upwards. I doubted she'd ever worked a day in her life. I equally doubted that day would ever come.

"Any theories as to how the levels of radiation would've affected the ecosystem? What do you think it would be like now?" asked Pike, gazing back at his students expectantly. Some meek hands were raised but his eyes settled on me. "How about you, Bellamy?"

I grimaced, slouching back in my seat. "If anything were living, it could cause genetic anomalies, I guess."

"What do you mean by anomalies?"

I glanced from him to the surface of my desk. "I don't know," I murmured. "A two headed deer?"

That got a few cackles out of a few of my classmates, but Pike didn't join in. He nodded thoughtfully. "Radiation can have some strange effects. I'm not sure of any two-headed deer, but it's an interesting theory. Good." Unlike Clarke, this was the praise I got.

He moved on to another question and I faded into the background.

* * *

I was mopping a part of the floor when I heard it; thundering footfalls erupting down the corridor, causing anyone within earshot to stop and watch in curiosity. Or fear. I was one of the latter, and I had to remind myself that they weren't coming for me; the Guard had already taken everything I had. All that was left was my life, and it wasn't worth much.

I tried to keep my focus on the mop, but when the guards rounded the corner, dressed all in black like something foreboding, I couldn't resist a glance. My eyes met the Head of Guard—Shumway—for a moment before I registered the person he was escorting. He was tall, with disheveled blonde hair and eyes that looked vaguely familiar. Lines fanned from them, hinting at many past smiles, but he wasn't smiling now. I knew a death march when I saw one. This man was on his way to the airlock chamber. On his way to the stars.

As the Guard passed, the man's gaze met mine. They locked.

I used to be one of those hands on their shoulders, leading the living to their graves. Was any of them innocent? Was this man?

I expected him to look afraid, but he didn't. On the contrary, it was determination that burned in his eyes, and maybe even a little peace.

Something tightened inside me and I wondered what he'd done to deserve being floated. Was it theft? Black market trading? A second child that was now on their way to the Sky Box?

I swallowed.

So many secrets in those eyes. I wanted to know who this man was, if he was a father. If he had a reason to live. But I couldn't do anything but stare back.

The man didn't look away, not until he was forced down the corridor and he had no choice but to break the contact. But I kept looking; I watched the guards lead him forward; watched as he disappeared around the bend. Even when he was gone, I couldn't shake the look in his eyes. That pride, even as he walked to his death. That peace.

It was a look that would haunt me for the rest of my life.

* * *

I shouldn't have done it. Guilt plagued me. It ate away at my insides and made my head swim. And then it made me angry. Why should I feel guilty for killing a murderer? For killing my mother's murderer? I should be glad he was dead. I should be grateful I was the one who got to pull the trigger.

These thoughts lasted only a heartbeat, between the dropship detaching for the Ark and kicking up speed. I held onto the straps I'd tied around myself, keeping me to the walls. Ragged breathing and muffled screams drifted up to me from the one hundred individuals far below me, buckled in their seats. I could see some through the crack in the small spacing between the metal rafters.

The sensation of falling grew more intense, shaking me to my core and I clutched on the straps. I closed my eyes and breathed in shallow spurts through my mouth.

The dropship suddenly lurched forward, followed by a loud crash and a chorus of shouts echoing around me. "What was that?" One person screamed.

 _The atmosphere,_ I wanted to say, but I was distracted by someone suddenly obscuring my limited view. Two lounging figures drifted beneath me.

Some idiots had untied their buckles and were now floating around the heart of the dropship. If they didn't get in their seats, they wouldn't be the first humans to return to ground. They'd be the first to be buried beneath it.

"Hey, you two!" someone shouted, as if reading my mind. "Stay put if you want to live!"

But it was too late. The inside of the dropship shook violently. Some parts of the walls began peeling back. The place grew hot and stifling and I was struggling to breathe. I kept my eyes on the two floating idiots.

My body suddenly dropped, feeling weighted like my very blood had been turned to iron. A smack came from below and I stared as one of the idiots slammed against the wall, rattling around like a ball in a can. I saw a splatter of red and then the dropship gave one last shudder. The belts held me in place, forcing out the air from my lungs. Smoke bloomed around me.

Everything went still.

"Are we down?" another person asked, but I was already clamoring to unfasten the belts. I unraveled them and took in the burning air. My heart was pounding with enough force to knock me over, but I didn't pay it any mind; I was too focused on reaching someone just below me. I freed myself as the others did. Broken words sounded from below, a mix of fear and excitement and panic wafting up to me.

I used the beams as leverage, holding onto the rafters with shaky hands. I wiggled my way between them and dropped.

I was instantly enveloped by a tight throng of people. Elbows bit into my sides. Feet stepped on mine. I shoved my way through, towards the front entrance. I kept my eyes open for brown hair and blue eyes.

"The outer door is on the lower level!" I said, nearly having to shout to be heard over the chatter.

Someone ahead of me turned around. A curtain of blonde fanned around her face.

"No, we can't just open the doors," Clarke Griffin said to me.

I tried to swallow my surprise but it was hard. It would seem she had lost her hold on the social elite's ladder, falling down, down, down to where the rest of us were. A better person would've felt bad for her, but all I felt was smug. Much good all that studying did her.

"Hey," I barked at those around me, still elbowing me and breaking my toes. "Just back it up, Guys!"

Finally they obliged and I made it to the door. It was as imposing as any airlock chamber's. I reached for the switch.

"Stop," Clarke said to me, her brows furrowed in hesitation. "The air could be toxic."

I looked at her through narrowed eyes. Up on the Ark, she was a princess. But down here she was like the rest of us; disposable, rejected, sentenced. I wouldn't take orders from her kind again. This time, she would take them from me.

"If the air is toxic," I told her, "we're all dead anyway."

* * *

He was going to die. There was no question about it. The burns were too severe, scorching his whole body and melting the first layers of flesh. Blood bubbled in the corners of his mouth. Milky eyes stared at me, but his gaze went straight through, blind.

My legs shook beneath me.

His cracked lips gaped, asking me a question with no voice. He knew he was going to die, too. He just wasn't going as quickly as he wanted.

"Pl-ease," Atom begged me, clutching at the dirt beneath him. "Ki-kill me."

The air in my lungs evaporated as I dropped to my knees beside him. My jaw worked but I couldn't think of anything kind to say. He was dying and he was in pain. No words could change that.

With quivering fingers, I retrieved the small blade in my pack.

Atom kept begging, not seeing the jagged edge of the blade I gripped in my hand.

 _This is for him,_ I tried to tell myself. I wasn't killing him. I was ending his pain. Nothing more.

Yet I couldn't seem to raise the blade. Instead I sat motionless, staring at the dying boy at my knees. Seconds passed, but it may as well have been an eternity.

The snapping of a twig grabbed my attention and I looked up. A blonde halo was moving through the brush and a moment later, Clarke appeared. She stopped in her tracks, looking from me to Atom.

There was a question in her eyes and in reply, I gave a small shake of my head.

She pursed her lips and came over. I didn't know what to expect as she sat down on Atom's other side, opposing me. He heard her and his white eyes swiveled in her direction. The pleas poured from his mouth like blood.

Clarke took a deep breath and nodded. "Okay," she whispered. She reached up and laid one hand on Atom's hair, caressing it gently. Kindly.

With the other, she motioned for the knife.

Silently, I handed it over. My throat felt tight as her fingers moved through Atom's hair. And then, she started to hum. It was a soft melody that came from somewhere deep inside her, gentle and sweet. it was such a stark contrast to the cruel blade she held in her hand. It grinned in the afternoon light as she teased the tissue at Atom's neck.

I wanted to look away but I couldn't. Memorized, I watched as she dug in the blade, quick and smooth. The humming didn't cease. A stream of blood came from the wound. Her fingers continued to sweep through his hair, again and again, until Atom's head fell to the side. His pleas were answered.

I didn't move from my spot for a long time and neither did Clarke. We didn't say anything and I was glad for it. _You don't have the courage to make the hard decisions,_ our earlier confrontation over Jasper came back to me. _I do._

But I'd been wrong. I'd underestimated her. She may have been privileged, but she wasn't weak. And for the first time since coming down to Earth, I found myself respecting her.

When we returned to camp, I watched her retreat back into the dropship. Without looking at the man at my side, I spoke the words I never thought I'd say.

"Get Clarke whatever she needs."


	8. Monster Inside

**Okay, so . . . this kind of depressed me. Post-grounder-army-annihilation, when Bellamy finally comes to terms with what he's done.**

His body felt like lead, weighed down by every mistake he'd made. By ever drop of innocent blood his hands had spilled.

And he'd spilled so much.

Bellamy couldn't get the images out of his head, of broken people cloaked in the stench of blood. They were faceless, but he remembered the cries with perfect clarity. The shape of their mouths. Their screams as he shot them. They echoed around him now.

Maybe for a moment amidst the horror, he'd been successful in truly believing it had been the right thing to do. For a single heartbeat, he had convinced himself he was protecting his people. But now he understood; he hadn't been protecting them. He'd only put his people in greater danger, and in doing so, had turned himself into the very thing he swore he never wanted to be. A murderer. A monster.

He stood on that very field now. The sky hung lifeless and grey, all color leeched out. The browning grass curled inwards with the first signs of the coming winter months. Maybe it was a trick of his eyes, but Bellamy thought the patches of dirt were tainted red, so full of blood that no amount of rain could wash away. The dead were gone now, but it was like the earth remembered.

Bellamy clenched his hands until his own blood fled from the fingertips and dripped from his palms instead, skin broken by his nails.

He wanted to rewind time. To warn that army. To carve out the guilt that that made his shoulders slouch under the crushing weight of it all. He knew there was no forgiveness for this.

"Bellamy?" a voice came from behind him.

He didn't have to turn around to know who it was. That voice was second to his own, always in his head, helping him discern right from wrong.

But when she'd left, he'd forced its silence out of his own hurt, and this . . . had been the result.

"Go away, Clarke," he said in a grave voice, unable to face her. It was cowardly, but he was already a coward. He couldn't stand the look of hate he'd find there. If he held a mirror in his hands, he'd see that look in his own eyes.

He heard the soft crush of dirt as she ignored him and came closer, stopping just at his back. He could feel the heat of her.

"Bellamy, I-"

"I said leave!" he shouted, the words tearing from his throat. They echoed around him, his screams joining the others. "You don't have to say anything," he added. "I already know. Believe me."

She had to loathe him. He did. Bellamy loathed his own hands, his fingers that had emptied rounds of brass.

Clarke touched his shoulder and he flinched back from the contact, as if it burned.

"Look at me, Bellamy," she ordered.

But he couldn't. He kept his gaze on the dying ground. On the empty sky. On the mountain ridge that seemed a world away and just as unreachable. Maybe he'd travel to them one day. Maybe he'd start walking and never stop.

Clarke hooked a hand on his coat.

This time, Bellamy whirled around, yanking out of her grasp. "What?" he asked angrily. His voice felt raw. "What is it you want?"

Light eyes blinked up at him, as colorless as the surroundings. A worry line formed between her brows. "I'm not going to ask if you're okay," she said slowly. "Because I know you're not."

Bellamy scoffed at the sky. "Do you really care if I'm okay?"

Clarke lifted her hand again but when Bellamy moved a step back, she let it fall back to her side. A look of confusion crossed over her features. "Of course I care," she said, a little defensively.

Bellamy stared back at her, bewildered. He waited for the fury to enter her eyes. The hate. For everything he was feeling towards himself to pour from her, too. But he didn't see any of that. All he saw was concern.

But that only made him angrier.

"You shouldn't," he practically spat. "I don't deserve to be okay."

Clarke winced, at the same time thunder clapped deep within the rolling clouds. A drop of water splattered on the shoulder of his jacket.

"You made some bad choices," she agreed. "And you'll have the rest of your life to live with them. But it wasn't _all_ on you. Pike initiated it. Pike-"

"He didn't force me to pull the trigger," Bellamy ground through clenched teeth. The guilt grew heavier. His bones splintered. His veins snapped like twigs. "He didn't force me to aim the barrel and shoot again and again and _again_. He wasn't the one who made me an executioner, Clarke. _I_ did that."

More raindrops fell around him. They caught in Clarke's hair and crowned her head like small jewels.

"I knew what I was doing," he said. "And I did it anyway. Even when they were begging me to stop, I-" Bellamy shook his head violently in an attempt to shake away the images, but they were stuck to him like the flesh was to bones. "I kept going. Until they were all dead."

"What about Indra?"

Bellamy tossed up a hand. "Fine. One life. I saved one life, after taking dozens of others." He turned in a circle; tore his fingers through his hair. He faced her again. "This isn't like Mount Weather. For once I _had_ a choice. And I chose to murder them in cold blood. That," he cringed internally, wanting to free himself from his own body. He wished to be someone else. He wished to disappear altogether. "That makes me a monster."

Clarke latched onto one of his hands with her one, holding tight. Hers were just as cold as his. Beads of water dripped down her cheeks like tears. "We're all monsters here, Bellamy. None of us are innocent."

Bellamy pulled his hands out of hers and moved another step backwards, away from her, from everything. He stared off into nothingness. "Those people were. They were just trying to help us and I thanked them by putting a bullet in their heads."

His vision swam, and it wasn't with rainwater. "It's time to face facts, Clarke. I don't protect people. I kill them."

Clarke gestured to the area behind her. Curls of blonde began sticking to her forehead. "Have you forgotten that there is a camp full of our people who would testify against that?" she snapped harshly. "Yes, Bellamy; you've killed people. But the dead won't come back." She took a step towards him, the crush of the dry dirt gone. "The only thing you can do now is move on, and not make the same mistakes twice."

That guilt raged inside him, destroying everything in its path. It reigned ruin, turning his blood to ash. "And what if I can't move on?" he asked, his voice rising in volume to be heard over the chorus of rain. "How can I when it should've been me? It deserved to be me and yet, I'm still here. Over and over. I'm tired of this, Clarke!" he shouted. "I don't want to fight to stay alive _for this_."

Clarke gave a small shake of her head, loosening a stray hair the water had plastered to her face. Rivulets of rain fell from her chin. "We're all just trying to surv-"

"Survive," he interjected, droplets falling from his lip and into his mouth. "It's always for survival, as if that makes it okay. But you know what this showed me? It showed me my life isn't worth my soul." He smirked without humor. "Ending it would do us all a favor."

Clarke stilled. Her eyes widened, filling to their full capacity with fear as she took in his meaning. They suddenly looked less grey and more blue. "Bellamy," her voice shook with barely-controlled panic. Maybe even rage. "You can't."

"Why not?"

"Because I can't do this without you. Any of it."

Bellamy's voice turned incredulous. "You sure seemed to get along just fine without me when you left." It was a low blow, and he saw the ember of hurt, but he didn't care. If she didn't hate him yet, maybe he could give her another reason to.

"I wasn't," she said, a note of sadness in her voice. "But I had to go."

"And you didn't look back," Bellamy hissed. "I needed you and you weren't there. You were off on your own, getting what you needed while what I needed was you." He laughed, a mirthless sound grating in the back of his throat. "The one person who understood. But you don't anymore." He shut his eyes for a second. But he didn't like the images that flashed behind them and opened them once more. "I used to think I could be better. That I could be good. But this," he gestured to the field with open arms. "This is who I really am. _And I hate him._ "

Clarke jaw was clenched, as were her hands, rolled into tight fists. Her voice turned as quiet as the rain would allow. "I don't."

"How could you not?"

"Because I know you," she said, and she sounded like she believed it. "I know the kind of person you are despite all of this. Everything would've been different if I'd stayed, I know that. But I didn't, and now people are dead." She came up to him and prodded him in the chest. "But you're not. This army may have been killed in cold blood, but if their loss makes us better-if it makes us value life just that much more-than at least they didn't die in vain."

Bellamy bit his lip and shook his head again. He was losing the fight in him and Clarke's words only drained it from him faster. He sank to his knees on the red dirt. It squelched under his weight, full of blood and rainwater.

His chest felt restricted, his ribs caging everything he couldn't show in front of the others. But there were no others here. There was just the grass and the rain and Clarke, standing above him with a look of pain in her eyes. Pain over his pain.

He'd wanted her to hate him because this was almost worse. But when he saw that she still didn't-that she wouldn't-Bellamy let go.

His eyes broke from hers and fell to the ground. Rainwater dripped from his hair as a quiet sob broke free from its cage. It was followed by another, and another. His shoulders shook with the force of them.

Clarke dropped to her knees in front of him and silently wrapped her arms around his neck.

Bellamy wanted to object. Comfort wasn't something he should've been given, not on the battlefield of those he'd slain. But he couldn't seem to keep his own arms from encircling her waist.

Rain soaked the both of them, chilling the air and their dank clothes. Yet they stayed where they were; in the middle of the field and under a solemn sky that threatened to drown them in its tears.


	9. Broken Pencils

**Excuse me as I scream into a pillow because for some reason I just found this really cute. It was requested to do a scene of Clarke drawing Bellamy, and then I got an idea and this happened. If anyone wants me to specify the requesters, I can. But I didn't know if some people didn't want me to share that information. Either way, let me know in any future requests :)**

I used my knees to support the makeshift pad of paper, bound roughly together by knotted twine. The piece of charcoal smeared between my fingers, and I took great care not to touch them to the paper's surface.

It was evening. Shadows had already begun swallowing the camp of Arkadia. I sat around the small fire, using its light to see by. But the page beneath me was still blank. Undecided. I put the tip of the charcoal to it, and began to draw.

Slowly, images came alive under my hand. They flashed through my mind in bold, sharp colors and I jotted the first one down. But it was only when I saw that I'd drawn a huge lever with fingers hooked around it that I flipped the page and started on a new sketch.

This time, the charcoal breathed life into a great tower, huge and imposing, stretching from the ground and into the sky like a hand. It would've been beautiful, if not for the flames erupting from the crumbling windows. If not for the villagers screaming and dying far below it.

I clenched my fist, nearly breaking the charcoal, and tried again.

A field materialized on the paper, but it was too littered with bodies for me to draw any grass.

I stood abruptly and threw the pad of paper on the stony ground. The binding snapped.

I ran a hand through my hair, staining the blond tendrils black. Suddenly, I wanted to cry. I drew to escape from the world. To disappear into the beauty of it. But that beauty had been burned down. There was just pain now. Pain and ruin and broken pencils.

I sat back down and stared into the fire, watching the embers burn and die.

Gravel crunched beside me and I glanced to find Bellamy walking towards me. He stopped at my side, looking from the pad of paper to me. He toed the corner of it with his boot. "Aren't you gonna pick this up?"

We hadn't spoken much in the last week and I knew he was hurting. I was, too. I wanted to talk to him about it, but ever since I'd refused to come back, I felt like there was a wall between us. We'd each contributed some bricks. Him, for helping Pike. Me, for leaving. Him, for killing the grounders. Me, for knowing we could've stopped it together.

I kept my gaze on the fire. "No."

With a sigh, Bellamy scooped up the pad and started to flip through the few pictures I'd depicted. In my periphery, I saw him study each one. I saw the pain when he reached the last. He didn't say they were good. He gave me no compliments. All he said was, "You don't need drawings to remember any of this."

I gave a small nod. The heat of the fire was starting to sting my cheeks. "I can't draw anything else," I whispered. "I've tried."

"Try harder," he deadpanned in his usual blunt tone. "Maybe you should draw a person instead."

"Like who?"

Bellamy stared at the bound paper for another moment before meeting my eyes. He picked up the charcoal fragment and extended both items to me. "Someone who gives you hope."

With dubious fingers, I took back the pad as Bellamy left me by the fire.

It took a minute for me to work up my courage, and I returned to an empty page, guided by Bellamy's words. Someone who gave me hope? I let my hand holding the charcoal decide who that was.

An hour later, Bellamy was smiling at me, but not from the camp. He was smiling up from the page as firelight danced in his dark eyes. The charcoal was messy, but the strokes were precise. I looked at it, feeling my heart both pinch and lighten. When was the last time I'd seen that smile?

I shook the thought from my head, surprised, and went to another empty page.

The next image was of me and Bellamy taking turns with a gun, aiming at a blanket we'd used as a target unfurled across the paper. I remembered that. It was before we'd used the guns in war. Before the bullets had shed blood. After that, Bellamy did not smile when holding his gun.

But it still worked. This world fell away, replaced by an older one a little easier to bear. I stopped seeing levers. I stopped hearing screams. I just drew. Again, his face was what poured from the tip of the charcoal. Memories inked themselves in. Some of the drawings were smaller, and I could fit them into one sheet. The weight in my chest was still there, but it had grown less prominent the more I drew.

They grew harder, though, as we lost our naivety of Earth. As we lost our innocence. I drew myself walking away from his sharp profile and towards the trees.

I leaned back and studied the images. It was a collection of good memories that ended on guilt. I wished I had the power to shout through the pages and tell myself not to walk away. But I knew she wouldn't listen. She _would_ go. And she would regret it.

I flipped the pad closed and stood.

I didn't see the person behind me until I turned and collided into him. The pad was torn from my hands. The already-broken binding lost its hold on the paper. White pages flitted to the ground like wings.

"Sorry," said Bellamy, crouching down to help collect the papers. "I just came to check how you were . . . " He drifted off as his eyes fell to the images he held. Of him. His hair fell over his eyes, obscuring his expression from me and I felt my heart hitch.

I lifted my hand to snatch them back. But Bellamy twisted out of my way, and rifled through the images. "What's this?" he finally asked, his voice nothing more than a breath.

I pursed my lips and shrugged, ignoring the embarrassment that flooded me. "It's you," I finally said.

His eyes snapped to me.

"You told me to draw someone that gave me hope," I clarified. "Turns out that person is you."

Bellamy seemed at a loss for words, eyes wide, hands still clutching the papers with tense fingers. "Clarke, I-"

"I'm sorry for leaving," I said. "People needed me. You needed me, and I knew that, but I still left. And then all of this happened and I-" my throat tightened, closing off the words. I swallowed. "I've missed you, Bellamy. And I just want us to be okay again."

He didn't speak for a minute and continued to watch me intently. Then he silently set down the papers and leaned over. He enveloped my hand in his. "I don't want to be okay, Clarke," he said, and fear instantly washed through me. But he squeezed my hand reassuringly. "I want to be _better_ this time. The both of us. Together."

The fear evaporated and I smiled at him. He returned it, the grinning boy from the paper suddenly before me again.

A gentle breeze swept up the pile of papers he'd set down and Bellamy quickly grabbed them with his free hand.

But not in time. One had managed to escape, and it caught in the fire.

Bellamy cursed under his breath and went to remove it from the flames but I pulled him back before he could reach for it.

I shook my head. "Let it go," I said, watching as the image of me walking away from him blackened at the edges and crippled into ash. My fingers tightened around his. "We don't need it anymore."


	10. Babies and Bread

**SOMEONE GIVE ME IDEAS BECAUSE I'VE GOT NOTHING HERE.**

Bellamy was lying in the cramped place beneath the boards, his back pressed firmly into the floor, when his sister spoke up from the shadows.

"Bell," the six-year-old murmured, shifting until she lay on her side, facing him. It was easier for her to maneuver in the spacing like it was made just for her. If a person were ever created to fit so neatly into darkness.

Though there was no light, the crack from above filtered some of the circadian glow inside, allowing him to make out her brilliant eyes, wide and curious and young.

He squirmed. Soon he would no longer be able to fit under the floor.

Grunting, he clinched his long legs into his chest, until he was Nearly pulled into a fetal position. Stupid growth spurt. "Yeah, O?" "Where do babies come from?"

The question made Bellamy jolt and he almost bashed his head on the floor's underside.

He blinked. "What?"

"You know, _babies_ ," she clarified, looking at him expectantly, those blue, blue eyes never moving from his. Her brown hair tumbled under her like a curtain, So dark it might as well have been black. "Where do they come from?"

Bellamy held back a stream of words his mother would be very disapproving of. He wished she were here and not at work. He wished Octavia had asked this at night, During the few hours she was allowed to come of out hiding and roam freely through their apartment. When their mother was home and could save him the trouble of answering such a complex question that he himself had never bothered to ask. Seeing your sister born had a way of answering sorts of questions most kids couldn't fully understand to form queries about.

Bellamy swallowed and his palms grew sweaty. He had a sudden urge to flee from beneath the floor as Octavia watched him studiously, one hand under a round cheek, the other draped over her tiny waist. There was nothing like a kid's scrutiny to make one feel intimidated.

As if hearing his thoughts, she raised her brows impatiently. "Well?"

Bellamy grimaced and tried to think of a good answer. One that was child-appropriate.

"Uh, babies," he struggled for the right words. "Um. They're kind of like...well...bread." he settled for, saying the first thing that popped into his mind."Like making bread." He thought of the stale loafs made in Agro Station. Bellamy hated that bread. It tasted like sawdust and had the consistency of cardboard, but Octavia latched onto the piece of information hungrily, her eyes going impossibly wider. "Like _baking bread_?" She asked incredulously.

Bellamy almost regretted the words but it was too late to turn back now. So he went with it.

"Yeah," he nodded, adjusting his knees. The floor was hurting his back. "You know bread needs special ingredients"-he winced internally,-"right? It's kind of like that. Two people, a boy and a girl, have these really special ingredients and when the Council gives them permission, they... mix them together and the girl bakes it. For a really long time. Until it's done."

Octavia's eyes remained as large as saucers. "In her tummy?"

"Yup. That's the oven."

"How does she know when it's done?"

 _She hurts_ , he thought, recalling the memories of their mother. _She crams a cloth in her mouth to keep the guard and other passerby from hearing her screams through the door._

He gave Octavia a small shrug. "She has a timer that goes off when it's ready to come out."

"Really?"

He scoffed. "Do you think I'd make this stuff up?"

Octavia smiled as she pondered this. And just as children had the knack for doing, didn't hesitate before launching another question at him. "Does that mean I have the ingredient?"

Again, Bellamy's head nearly collided with the low ceiling that was the rest of the ark's floor. Okay. That had taken a nosedive He hadn't foreseen. Now they were toeing the borders of a territory Bellamy didn't even want to look at, much less cross into.

"Not for a very long time," he answered, both stern and vague.

"But I can bake babies one day?" She craned her neck up as if challenging him to contradict her. "When I'm older?"

Bellamy didn't know whether to laugh or cringe. The idea of Octavia older was foreign enough without adding another, significantly smaller, human being to the image.

But a part of him liked that she was still thinking far, far ahead. This dark world hadn't snuffed out the dream that someday she could outgrow this perfectly sized spacing. That she could have more.

Despite the uncomfortable questions, Bellamy wanted to keep her hope of a future alive. He wanted to keep _any_ hope she had alive.

"Sure," he said. He reached over and ruffled her soft hair. "One day, O."


	11. Nevermore: Part One

**What if Clarke had been the one with the chip instead of Raven? What would happen if the pain was more emotional than physical? This will be in three parts. The first two are completed.  
**

I wanted them back. The memories. The pieces of me, taken and crammed into some corner of my mind I couldn't reach.

The fade was gradual. I didn't know anything was wrong until I couldn't recall what I wanted to in detail. My father's face was warped beyond recognition. I couldn't remember how to use a scalpel. I couldn't hear the screams of the Mountain Men.

I couldn't remember what it was like to feel guilty.

That was when I knew something was very, very wrong.

"What did you do?" I asked ALIE. We were in the med bay, waiting on my mom. I wanted to ask her about the chip. What she had discovered. But I needed to speak to ALIE first, who stood stoically before me, dressed from neck to knee in the color of blood. "Why . . . why can't I remember anything?"

"Humans do not seek relief in pain," ALIE replied robotically, hands clasped in front of her. "It is my job to extract everything that triggers it, including any relevant material."

I stared at her, a pit of horror forming deep inside me. My memories. My life. I could forget who I was, but that didn't change what I'd done. It didn't take this world by the seams and unravel my choices like spools of thread. Others still remembered. Especially the dead.

"Give them back," I said, voice breathy like her words had torn the air from my lungs. I heard my desperation. Heard it and felt it running through every inch of me. "I want them back."

ALIE blinked and tilted her head just slightly, barely enough to disturb her perfect auburn hair. She scrutinized me and a small line appeared between her brows, too human for my comfort. "Why? You have suffered a great deal, Clarke. It is my understanding that pain is human's greatest fear, second only to death. Why would you want to reclaim it?"

I couldn't think. I saw a woman but there was nothing there. Nothing living. Nothing real. Nothing human. She was a program, offering an out that had been too good to be true. And I'd fallen for it.

"Because I'm not . . . me," I said. "I don't deserve this. I've killed people. I owe it to remember them."

ALIE's gaze never left mine. "Your logic is flawed."

I walked over to her, wishing she was tangible so I'd have a target. I looked her in those too-mortal brown eyes. "This is what's flawed. Everything you are. You're wrong. You're a liar and a thief with ulterior motives and I'm telling you right now to _give me back my memories!"_

Just then, the door to the med bay swung open and in came my mom. But I didn't look at her. The only one I could see was ALIE.

Her expression didn't change, as if it were something carved from stone. She sighed again. Automatic. "Fine, but don't say I did not warn you."

And it hit. With the force of a tidal wave. Like a blindfold being pulled off, and I could suddenly _see._ The weight pressed against my temples, drowning me in terrible images. Of blood and gore and death. I thought I heard my mom calling for me, but it was muted by the hundreds of screams shredding my ears.

There were too many memories. Too many images to see them clearly. They blurred together until they became one huge mural of red and black. Shadows and ruin. Fire and ash.

"How does it feel, Clarke?" ALIE asked me, standing beside me on a cot. How'd I get on a cot?

"This was the pain you wanted," she continued. Her crimson dress amidst the terror made her look like something ethereal. "How does it feel?"

Like death, I wanted to say. Who I was, those pieces, they felt like death.

I clenched my jaw so hard I felt something crack.

"I can take it away," ALIE said, looking at me expectantly. Like she knew I would. Like this was a test she knew I'd fail. "All you have to do is say yes."

I grit my teeth. My nails bit into my palm. I could feel something wet sliding between my fingers.

"Just say yes, Clarke."

"No," I choked, the word strangled. Barely a breath.

The tidal wave grew, and the faces of children flashed before my eyes. More screams.

"Say yes, Clarke."

"No."

"Clarke-"

I felt something prick my neck and a sweet darkness swept over me. Those images dissipated into nothing. I nearly sighed in relief when the world went from red to a beautiful black.

* * *

I had the vague impression of being carried. Poorly, like the person was struggling to bear my weight. Wind nipped at my arms. Sounds faded in and out. The rustling of branches. The crush of dirt and dead leaves.

Blackness tumbled in again.

"Clarke?" I heard someone say, what felt like mere moments later. Instinctively, I retracted into myself, reminded of ALIE. Reminded of all that blood and horror. I wanted back into the dark.

"Tell me what happened," the voice barked, much too hard for ALIE. Much too low to be a woman. An image of a curly-haired man flashed through my mind. Bellamy.

"ALIE," said someone else, voice hoarse and full of contempt. I almost didn't recognize it as Jasper. He used to be bursting with life. Now, just the sound of him was off. As wrong as a program stealing memories.

"The chip I was telling you about. It messes with your head; makes you see her," he explained. "Clarke was screaming in the med bay and Abby knocked her out. I tried to get to the others but . . ."

"But what?" I felt Bellamy's presence, standing somewhere close by.

Jasper swallowed. "But Jaha had already chipped everyone."

"That better be followed by you telling me how we can get it out of her."

"Yeah, Raven was-"Just then the world seemed to drop as Jasper staggered.

"Here, give her to me," Bellamy said, and I felt my weight transferred from weak arms to a pair of infinitely stronger ones. I could hear his heartbeat, pounding like a drum at my ear. "Now what about Raven? Where is she?"

A pause.

"I couldn't get her out," Jasper said, tone dropping a few degrees. "Jaha was watching her like a hawk but I remember her saying something about the wristbands."

" _Our_ wristbands?"

"Yeah."

"We'll ask Sinclair," Bellamy started walking.

"Say yes, Clarke."

The change in voice was enough to pull me from the shallow waters I'd been lingering under and my eyes flew open. I was greeted by trees, painted black with evening. Bellamy's face appeared above me, tense and anxious, but behind him...

"I just need your agreement, Clarke," said ALIE, the fabric of her dress appearing black in the shadows. "And I will make it stop."

I hesitated, just enough to draw up my courage. Then I gave a small, almost imperceptible, shake of my head.

The images slammed into me once more.

Harder, heavier, clearer than before. More blood. More death. I saw eighteen graves, the dirt newly disturbed. I watched a girl pitch herself over a cliff and disappear, as swift as a candle flame being blown out.

"Stop!" I screamed, grabbing my head as if I could tear out the images. Bellamy almost dropped me and his look of anxiety gave way to what could only be fear.

"What's happening to her? Clarke?"

"It's ALIE," Jasper said, and I watched him through one eye as a world burned through the other. He pulled something small from his pocket. A syringe.

"These people cannot help you, Clarke," ALIE chimed, standing at my head now, brown eyes boring into my head. No one else noticed. Bellamy was too busy pulling back my hair as Jasper fumbled with the syringe.

"Only I can take it all away," she said.

I was so tempted. Every part of me was trying in vain to claw away from the images. That horrible, relentless pain. But I owed this to my ghosts. I owed it to remember them.

I raised my chin in one small act of defiance. "No."

ALIE nodded. "Have it your way then."

Another wave surged, but before it could crash over me, that same tingling sensation kissed my neck. "We're gonna help you, Clarke," Bellamy's words floated down to me through the fresh wave of darkness. "We'll fix this."

He lied almost as well as ALIE.


	12. Nevermore: Part Two

The strong arms were gone. In their place fell the soft pelts of fur. I was on a bed. The smell of burning wood hung heavy on the air, oak and spice and something that smelled old.

"She's waking up," someone noted. This one was female, but I knew it wasn't ALIE. I thought it was Octavia.

"Give her another dose," Bellamy said, to Jasper, I assumed.

"That was the last one."

"It's _hurting_ her."

"I could've left her behind. But I got her out of there," Jasper hissed, his words coated in that contempt. Contempt for _me_ , I realized. "As far as I'm concerned, I don't owe her or you anything."

Bellamy gave no reply.

"How's Sinclair doing on the wristband?" that feminine voice sounded. Definitely Octavia.

"We left him in the other room," said Bellamy, not bothering to elaborate.

A few minutes elapsed in silence, and I spent them trying to force my way back under the waves. Into the blackness. Because I knew, without even opening my eyes, that she was close by. Waiting.

And then, just like that, the last bits of the darkness evaporated. I didn't want to open my eyes. Didn't want to see her standing close enough to touch me.

As if I'd called her, something warm fell over my hand and I flinched. But then the hold tightened. Fingers gripped my own. "Clarke?" Bellamy's voice came, just above a whisper.

"I told you already that they won't be able to help you," she said, and I could feel her on the opposite side of Bellamy.

My hand latched onto his, fear washing through me like ice water. My eyes snapped open again and there was ALIE on my left. Dutiful. Punctual. Deadly.

 _No, no, no, no._

"What is it?" Bellamy demanded, the edge in his voice sharpened to a brilliant point.

"I am the only one who can end your pain," she said.

"No," I managed, forgetting Bellamy's words. Forgetting everything except the woman standing beside me.

"Clarke." Bellamy's other hand went under my chin and he forced my eyes to him. "You have to tell me what's happening," he said slowly.

I opened my mouth to do exactly that. To tell him about the AI. To beg him to get this _thing_ out of my head.

But I was cut short by the world erupting around me.

Blood. So much blood. It didn't touch any part of me except my hands. They were drenched in it.

Bellamy saw the change and stood abruptly, leaning over me. "Clarke? Tell me what she's doing!"

"She's . . ." My body felt like lead, each breath harder to take than the last. "She's making me remember."

Bellamy shook his head in confusion, eyes wide, hand still bound around mine. "Remember what?"

 _Everything._

I saw my dad, the once-warped image of him now crystallized. I watched again as he stepped into the airlock chamber and was sent out into space. I recalled the rawness of my throat as I screamed after him.

"You know it wasn't your mother who cost your father his life," ALIE drawled, fingers laced together. Her head was positioned in that perpetual tilt. "It was you. You could have done more. You could have saved him."

"Shut up," I ground, squeezing my eyes shut. I opened them.

"And Charlotte," continued ALIE, glancing away as if she were picturing the little girl that had murdered my best friend. "She was lost." ALIE's eyes met mine again. "And you could not save her, either. How could you, when you failed to recognize the signs of her instability?"

My breathing grew sporadic as my heart broke inside my chest. Over and over again, as everything I did, the person I was, was uncovered piece by piece.

"And Finn," said ALIE. "You did kill him. Tell me, what did it feel like to have the blood of the boy you loved coating your hands?"

That memory flashed across my vision, like I was reliving it. I stood before Finn again, the small blade clenched in my hand, sliding between his ribs.

"They would've tortured him," I said, but it came out as a whimper. I didn't want to remember this. I didn't want to _be_ this.

ALIE took a seat on the bed, so close to me my skin crawled. "And what about the mountain?"

I flinched again as my vision was consumed by the memories. I saw the Mess Hall, filled with bleeding bodies. "What is your excuse for this?"

My eyes stung. "I didn't have a choice!"

From somewhere far away, I heard Bellamy yelling at the others to go and find something to help.

But they wouldn't find anything. It was entirely possible that I wasn't someone salvageable. Maybe I didn't want to be.

"You chose to save your people by wiping out theirs," murmured ALIE. "That burden . . . must be quite heavy."

More images. That tidal wave grew to something otherworldly. I saw Jasper's face as he clung to Maya. I felt the pressure of the lever branding my palm as I pulled it down. I heard the screams that followed just moments after.

"Stop," I gasped, tears slipping out and running down my cheeks.

"Get Sinclair in here now!" Bellamy roared.

"I need your agreement first," ALIE said. "And I will do as you ask."

I ground my teeth together and yanked my fingers from Bellamy's. I clutched at my head, nails biting into my scalp. I half expected to find my hands full of shards from my shattered skull.

"Say yes, and the pain will end."

I pulled my knees into me and shook my head.

"You try to save everyone," ALIE said, leaning a bit closer, not a hint of remorse on her perfect, human face. "And in doing so, you unknowingly condemn them all. You are their doom."

 _"People die when they're around you."_ Bellamy's words rang back to me.

 _"One hundred and eighty two men,"_ came Emerson's voice. _"One hundred and seventy three women. Twenty six children. Two of them were mine."_

"That is who you are," said ALIE. "Wanheda."

I screamed.

It was a sound that came at the edge of a precipice. On the ruins of a broken city. Before the murderer of your people, with the knowledge that you were the last of your kind.

I screamed in denial, as the images came again and again, like the lashings of a whip. I was committing those acts for a second time. All of it.

"This battery isn't charged enough," I heard someone say, but the sounds of the others were devoured by the screams ringing around me.

"Agree, Clarke," ALIE told me. "And end this."

 _Take it_ , I nearly said. _Stop the pain. Stop it all._ I felt the words on my tongue.

That earlier warmth appeared again, this time at my cheek. Bellamy's hand cupped my face and I looked from ALIE long enough to see his eyes. Brown and scared and haunted. Human. "We're almost there, Clarke. Just hold on."

 _Hold on._

Then the memories surged up, like a wall. Impenetrable. I saw a line of kids waiting in a hall. I remembered Maya's kind smile. The peace on my dad's face as he drowned in a sea of stars. I remembered Ontari, sitting on a throne before the bodies of the children she broke.

I hit my lip so hard it bled. I felt Bellamy's hand tense against my cheek.

"Say it, Clarke," ALIE repeated. "Say it and all of this will be over."

I forced my eyes to her, to see through the images that cloaked me. People hurting and bleeding and dying around me. As brilliant and fleeting as embers.

She'd wanted me to lose myself. And I'd wanted to be lost. Maybe, if this involved only me, I would take her up on that offer.

But it didn't.

 _"Pain is human's greatest fear, second only to death."_

It was a good thing, then, that I wasn't afraid to die.

"What are you thinking, Clarke?" Asked ALIE, though I knew she could access my thoughts if she wanted. This was the last shred of free will she was giving me. Waiting for me to give it right back.

"I think," I said, in a voice that sounded like rocks grinding together. Someone burst back into the room with a metal box in hand. "That my friends are going to fry you."

"Survival may not be possible," said ALIE, looking from the others to me. "This could eliminate you."

I almost smiled. "Then I guess I'll see you on the other side."

 _"Now!"_

A buzzing sensation ignited over my skin and wound up my neck.

And then I was burning. Burning, burning down with the rest of the world.

It broke apart and collapsed from under me. I felt myself falling, the memories wrapping around me like a cold blanket, suffocating me.

Far above, someone else was shouting, but the words were lost to the cacophony of ruin. There was just the guilt and the regret keeping me company.

For a little while.

But then came the faces. They bloomed around me, and it was like I was suddenly standing in a huge crowd. A crowd of the dead. There was my father, and Wells. I glimpsed Lincoln. And there were others, whose names I didn't know because I'd never wanted to learn them.

The noises grew, louder and louder, and it was only when all their mouths opened, that I realized they were shouting one thing. Over and over again.

 _"Wanheda,"_ they screamed.

They pressed in on me and I raised my hands to ward them off.

Men, women, children. They were all shouting, so loud it rattled through my head and shook up my blood. I saw the hate in some of their eyes while I caught only simple questions in others.

 _Why_ , they all seemed to ask. _Why did you kill me?_

"I'm sorry," I said, choking on that one, pitiful word. "I didn't want this. I'm sorry!"

They came closer, pushing, shoving. Their faces blocked out everything else, too many to count.

This time, I didn't put up a fight. I just dropped my arms, and let them in.


	13. Nevermore: Part Three

**Okay, I'm sorry I haven't updated. My writing doesn't like me right now. It's rebelling. For everything. But please review if you have more ideas. I still have the rest of Wanheda to write, it's just taking its pretty little time to spark inspiration.**

Death liked to tease.

I was starting to realize that, as the blackness I was surrounded in began to curb, like waves rolling back into the sea. Or maybe I was dead and this was what came for executioners. I didn't know whether to fear that punishment, or be grateful I was given one at all. Finally, something I deserved.

It wasn't until I heard the voices that I knew I wasn't completely dead. At first, I thought they were my ghosts. But I doubt any ghost would have the sick humor to tell its brother they look dead on their feet.

"Are Jasper and Monty still guarding the door?" the latter responded instead. I recognized Bellamy's voice instantly, even though his name wouldn't appear in my head.

"For now." Octavia. "I know you don't want to move her but we can't wait any longer," she said, an edge to her tone, one having been present since Lincoln. Dimly, I wondered if it would ever soften again. "ALIE's minions could be waiting for us right now. The rest of us are going back to Arkadia." A pause. "With or without you."

Footsteps signaled to me that she was leaving and I heard the sift of cloth being moved as she ducked behind some kind of flap or curtain.

It was good timing. Already, feeling was starting to bleed back into me. Those black waters were gone, becoming nothing more than a wading pool, steadily drying out. I could feel my hands and my toes. But louder was the pain in my skull. And when strong hands wove beneath my legs and head, jostling my head, the points at my temples flared. Pain stabbed at the base of my neck, chasing away the last drops of dark water.

A hiss escaped me as my eyes opened.

Instantly the hands on me went still, and then tightened, ever so slightly. "Clarke?"

Something pounded in my ear and it took me a second to realize it was Bellamy's heart. I looked up at him, moving only my blurred gaze and not my head. I was greeted with molten brown eyes hovering over me.

"Hey," I said. Or tried to say. It came out strangled and dry, that one word scraping against my throat. I tried to clear it and winced.

"Hey yourself," said Bellamy, and though some of the tension seemed to lift from him, there was a worry in his eyes, in the form of that line, the one that always had a habit of appearing between his brows. "Here," he went to put me back down again, but I shook my head-and instantly regretted it.

"What is it?"

I clenched my teeth. "Headache," I murmured quietly, sounding fractionally more coherent.

"That would be from the EMP," he said. "Courtesy of Sinclair."

I resisted the urge to rub my scalp. "Remind me to give him my thanks."

"Clarke." This time, Bellamy didn't try to hide the haunted note in his voice or the haunted look crouching low in his eyes. He pursed his lips and though I doubted I was lighter than the pack he usually carried around, he listened and didn't relinquish his hold on me. "I know better than to ask what happened in there. But are you sure you're okay?"

I took a slow breath, exhaling through my mouth. The memories of the previous hours felt like nothing more than scattered remnants, once spearing buildings, now only ruins in my mind. But I remembered pieces, of the voices. The screams. The blame. Of my own raucous guilt.

I didn't have anything to grab onto so I settled for the lapel of his black jacket. "She wouldn't let me go."

As if to demonstrate, Bellamy pulled me closer, wary of my still-aching skull. "No, because she knew what you were capable of. You beat her this time, Clarke. Which means we can beat her again."

I tried to smile at his optimism, such a rare thing, but doubt crawled in. "It won't be easy," I said, wishing I sounded stronger. That I _was_ stronger. I was no such thing; on the contrary, I'd never been weaker in my life.

Bellamy hiked me up higher, until his breath alone was enough to disturb strands of my hair. And though there was fear in him, the look in his eyes was resolved, forged in flame and welded to iron.

"No," he agreed. "It never is."


	14. Wanheda: Part One

**Okay, so someone suggested I do a thing where Clarke comes back and finds Bellamy with Gina. Another person requested (awhile ago) that I make up a situation in which Bellamy is worried about Clarke being in danger, SO, this three-part shot will be a combination of the two. And this is updated ahead of part three Nevermore because this one was cooperating. Don't worry: when part 3 of the other is up, I'll put it in its rightful place.**

The camp has changed.

I don't know why it surprises me. It shouldn't. Time changes things. It changes people.

It's still Camp Jaha but it's . . . established. Something permanently carved into the earth. It's not a crash site anymore. It's a village, with walls and crow nests. Even a new name.

 _Arkadia._

It reminds me of our camp around the dropship. A lifetime ago.

I take a deep breath, feeling it lodge itself between my ribs. My back straightens like a wound-up toy, ready to charge forward. Confident.

But I'm not confident. I'm terrified. I hide my sweaty palms under a pair of weathered gloves and my fear behind a mask of indifference. That won't last, I know. I'll break once I step into this camp. Home.

But it doesn't feel like home anymore.

The sun glares down from its midday perch, like it's daring me to turn back. There's a chilled breeze—the first signs of winter— yet I'm not cold. More sweat collects on my neck and slides down my back as I walk. Dirt pops under my soles as the camp rises up before me, huge and imposing and formidable in its own right. The shadow it casts reaches out nearly half a kilometer and I stop at the edge of it, eying it like a border.

I force my foot over it and keep going.

I'm close enough now for the voices to reach me.

"Stop!" someone shouts, and I raise my hands. I look pointedly at both crow nests, stationed on either side of the gate, and angle my face so they can see it.

"Let me through," I say.

Silence.

And then—

"Open the gate! It's Clarke!"

A grating noise starts up as the gate is pulled open. The metal shrieks as I approach the massive door. The plaque that reads _Arkadia_ above it is dull and rust-eaten. But it doesn't hold my attention for long.

My eyes drop as the camp comes into view. It's the same, save for the gardens erected around the mouth of the Ark. The people that were milling about just moments ago have stopped, standing straight, looking at the gate.

Looking at me.

That breath between my ribs morphed into a rock. I've barely taken another step before those people are separating, letting someone through.

They stop.

Brown eyes stare at me from under a mop of unruly dark hair. He looks taller, somehow. More dignified in his black uniform.

The breath leaves me entirely.

Bellamy blinks at me, like he's trying to decide if I'm really there. The strap of his rifle hangs loosely from his shoulders. Deja vu courses through me, making this all seem unnervingly surreal.

Then Bellamy's dropping his gun on the ground and walking towards me. Fast. Pebbles and dirt and blades of grass are crushed by his boots.

 _Please don't be mad,_ I think. _Please don't hate me. I'm sorry._ The words are on the tip of my tongue.

But then he's there and his hands are on me, pulling me to him in a bone-crushing hug.

Something crumbles inside me and I latch onto him. My arms curl around his neck and I _hold on_ like he's air and I'm drowning. I didn't even realize how much I've missed him until now.

Distantly, I note the people that have come over to us, but I don't let go yet. I'm not quite ready.

Bellamy seems to sense it, or maybe he feels that way himself, because he doesn't release me. His arms stay locked around me for a few more seconds and the relief is enough to dislodge the rock embedded in my chest.

Then I can't ignore the others anymore, and Bellamy loosens his hold enough to pull back. He scans my face and somehow, one of his hands has made it to my left temple and he's tucking back a strand of hair.

The gesture feels so natural, so strangely intimate. It runs deeper than blood, down to the very souls welded and pitted by the same blackness.

It pillages me of any decent response.

Bellamy shakes his head, just a little, like he's in disbelief. "I can't believe you're here."

Even with the hide jacket, my arms suddenly feel cold. "Yeah, I"—

"It's been months, Clarke," he says, but there was no edge in his voice. No accusation.

The guilt I've been collecting each day since leaving instantly doubles. "I know. I . . . I have a lot to tell you."

But more people are coming. I spot my mom and Octavia, followed by Lincoln, Raven, and Monty.

I look back at Bellamy. "Later," I tell him.

He nods curtly in agreement.

I'm hugged. Again and again. By my mom and Raven. By Octavia and Monty. Even by Lincoln. But I feel the absence of Jasper, and even more so when I spot him in front of the Ark's mouth. His eyes meet mine.

Then he turns, and walks away.

I squander the pang of hurt I feel before it can take root. Bellamy catches my stare. "He needs more time."

I purse my lips but acquiesce, and return my attention to the others. My mom and practically everyone else barrages me with the same questions, on a never ending loop, the most redundant one being the obvious:

"Where have you been?"

I sigh, and next to me, Bellamy raises his hands over his head. "Back up, Guys!" he shouts at them and they oblige, albeit begrudgingly. "We're on our way to the Council Room to go over some things. Harper, Miller, get back to your posts! As for the rest of you, I encourage you to go do something productive until we're finished." And with that, Bellamy bends over, picks up the gun he discarded, and heads for the Ark. I stay between him and my mom with Octavia and a few others following behind.

Once in the room decorated with nothing more than a circular table broken in one place, I want to collapse in one of the few chairs. But I force myself to stay standing.

Everyone's eyes are on me. My mom's are practically burning a hole in my skull. We've barely stepped into the room before it starts.

"Clarke, where were you?" my mom grills, arms crossed, shirt cuffed to her forearms. " _Three months_. Three months, we"—

"I know," I interrupt, because I'm tired of the reminder constant reminder. Like I can't calculate the time that's passed. "And I'm . . . " I look at each of them in turn, stopping on Bellamy. "I'm sorry I left. But I came back with a warning. From the Ice Nation."

"Is this about what happened in Sector eight?" Raven asks, exchanging glances between my mother and Kane.

A coldness settles inside me. I don't even ask what sector eight is and jump to, "What happened?"

"Ice Nation territory," Bellamy answers. "There was an incident, just a few days ago. We got a signal from one of our beacons from Farm Station. We killed three of their men."

My blood cools and I try to keep the worry from bleeding into my face. I feel like he's leaving something out.

"They mentioned they were looking for someone," Octavia says, a wariness in her eyes that instantly sets me on edge. "Someone they call Wanheda. Commander of Death. That person wouldn't, by chance, have anything to do with your warning, would they?"

Now my blood is ice, splintering inside me. Wanheda. I hate that name. I hate what it means. I hate how fitting it is.

"Why don't you tell me your theory, Octavia?" I ask in a monotone. I saw the suspicion written in her eyes even before we stepped into the room. She knows. And maybe it makes me a coward, but I want her to be the one to say it out loud.

Bellamy looks between us, sensing something's off. "Do you know who this person is?"

"Octavia has an idea," I say, still watching her. I can't tell if she's angry being thrust under the spotlight, angry at me in general. Just because she accepted me into camp doesn't mean I'm forgiven.

Two heartbeats pass in eerie silence before she breaks it. "You," Octavia breathes, not loud but it seems to ring around the room. "It's you, isn't it?"

All eyes freeze on me and the cold in my veins dissipates. I suddenly just feel tired. I nod. "And I'm being hunted for it."

"Wait," Bellamy says, his voice going hard. " _You're_ Wanheda?"

I meet his eyes, glowing obsidian in the low-light. "Yes."

He swallows that bit of information quickly before moving on. "And who's hunting you? Ice Nation?"

"Everyone."

The room hushes as they take it in. Then:

"What for?" Bellamy demands. " _We're_ the ones who wiped out _their_ enemy."

"Exactly," I say with perfect calm. It's almost unsettling. "That's why they think I'm an advantage. Some grounders believe that taking a life gives them power. The more powerful that person was, the more powerful they'll be. And since I irradiated Mount Weather"—

"We," Bellamy amended, a bite to his tone. " _We_ did that. The both of us."

I clench my hands. "They don't know that."

"Then let's go tell them."

"Why?" I ask, surprised at the flicker of anger that lights inside me. "So they can hunt you, too? Put down trap after trap until you're walking through the forest like it's a landmine?"

"So they can't hold you responsible for every death of every person in that mountain," he shoots back. The same fire fueling me burns in his eyes.

"That won't change their minds. They'll just add your name to their kill list."

"Or find neither of us worth the effort with half the kill glory," Bellamy sneers, spitting out those last two words.

The others in the room seem to fall away, and it's just me and Bellamy, staring each other down. "I'm not willing to take that risk," I say quietly. Levelly.

Bellamy tilts his head to the side. "That's not your call to make."

My anger grows. It twists and builds, but I stay calm as I say, "Then I'll lie. After all, it's your word against Wanheda's."

It's a low blow and Bellamy's eyes turn to black tempests. But I know if it comes down to that, I'll go through with it. And before the court of the Ice Nation, standing as the Commander of Death, it would be very easy to paint Bellamy as nothing more than a man trying to protect a powerful asset. It's a dishonor to him, in every sense of the word. But one I would gladly bestow, if it left him with his life.

And he knows it, too.

He stares at me, hard, until my face starts to burn from the heat in his eyes. I don't look away, though. I don't take it back.

"And the warning you're referring to?" Kane says, shattering our small war. My gaze snaps off from Bellamy's and I look over at Kane, standing beside my mother. "You need to double your security. It won't be long before their scouts are sent this way."

"To retrieve you?"

I don't answer. I don't need to.

"If you expect them to come here looking for you, isn't this the last place you should've gone?" Bellamy demands, crossing his arms over his chest. He seems to grow taller whenever he does that.

He's right. If I'm expecting the Ice Nation to make a move on me—which I am—I shouldn't be here. I shouldn't, if it's my life I'm concerned about.

It's not.

"I have my reasons," I say cryptically, ignoring the scrutiny Bellamy looks me over with. I'll have to speak to him in private over the matter, to get him on my side. If he's behind it, others will follow until one outweighs the other.

And if he's not, well . . . it's a good thing I've planned ahead.

"So you were in hiding all this time," says Lincoln, voice quiet, but it carries its own volume around the room.

I look at his stoic build, obscured partially by shadow. He seems larger, like all the others. Or maybe it's me who's grown small. "Yeah."

"Where?"

"I stopped through posts on the outer province. Made camp by rivers. I kept moving."

"And now?" this question comes from Bellamy. The anger is still there, but under it shines something else. Something anxious and bottled. "Will you be moving on again?"

I think back to those faces in Mount Weather. The lives I've tried to protect but failed to. The promises I both made and broke. I think of Finn, my hand around a knife as I whispered that he would be okay before I dug it up between his ribs and into his heart.

I hold Bellamy's gaze.

"Yes," I say.

Lies, I've discovered, come easier with practice.

* * *

As soon as I reach my tent after the meeting, the flap whips open behind me and someone drops inside.

I don't even have to look to know it's Bellamy, but I do anyway.

This is my chance. The privacy I wanted to test my plan. I originally hoped he would work up to his anger. Not start with it.

"When do you leave?" he asks, standing like a statue by the tent's exit.

"Not until the Ice Nation shows its face," I say. _Lie._

It's not what Bellamy expected to hear. He smirks dryly. "You're kidding me, right?"

I don't say anything.

The smirk disappears and he takes a step closer. "Clarke, if they find you here, they'll kill you."

I raise my eyebrows. "You think I don't know that?"

"Not well enough if your plan is to stick around until they come knocking on our front door." One of his hands curls into a fist. The other on his gun strap tightens until his fingers turn white. "I know you, Clarke. You aren't one to make stupid decisions, so why are you making one now?"

I look at him, at his black uniform and gun hanging comfortably off his back. A formidable soldier. Even a more formidable leader.

"You think I should run," I say quietly.

Bellamy shifts his weight and doesn't look away. "You know what they'll do to you if you don't."

I take a deep breath and maybe it's in my imagination, but I find it tastes like ash. "So what? They come and you tell them I've been gone for three months? You think that _that_ will be enough?" I shake my head and step towards him, looming over me like a tower. "They won't leave without taking something, Bellamy. Someone to lure me out with. And you and I both know that it will work."

His tone turns to one of steel. "Not if they know who they're dealing with."

The implication in his words engulfs me in fear but I shove it down. "I won't have you starting a war over me."

"So what's your plan?" Bellamy hisses, that storm brewing in his eyes again. It's fire and ice, but I can't tell which is winning. "Handing yourself over? C'mon, Clarke. I know you have to have something better than that."

But I don't say anything. My silence is answer enough.

Bellamy stops. Not staring, not standing. He just . . . stops. The ice must've won, because he's frozen over. Then he thaws and manages a shake of his head. "No. That's . . . Clarke, that's insane."

And there's my idea, laid open bare before him.

"I won't put our people in jeopardy over this," I murmur softly. "It's not worth it."

Bellamy crosses over to me, closing the space between us. Now he _is_ a tower, looming over me, glaring. "Did you forget I pulled that lever, too? I condemned those people to death, same as you."

"But they don't know that!" I repeat my words from earlier, getting angry myself. At his stubbornness. Or maybe just at him.

"We do!" he practically shouts, his breath hot on my face. "We know it. So don't you dare think I'm gonna stand around and let you pay for one punishment worthy of two."

My hands quiver, but I keep them at my sides so he doesn't see. A glance from the floor and back up to him. That rock is back, settled at the base of my throat. "This isn't your call to make," I say. "Either you're with me . . . or you're not."

"You mean I'm either for you handing yourself over to be slaughtered or not." I hear the rage in his words. His gaze is an inferno. Furious. "And I'm not."

My voice finally breaks, letting out the anger, the desperation, the _fear,_ that's been building inside. Because he's not seeing. He's not getting it. "Bellamy, we're talking about keeping us out of another war!"

"We've tried that route," he snaps and his eyes take on a haunted look. "With Finn. We thought it would get the grounders on our side, but they still left us at Mount Weather. We're not doing that. Not again. Not with you."

"Bellamy"—

"No," he holds up a hand for a moment. Then lets it drop. "We're done here."

Before I can say anything else, he's gone, the flap to my tent fluttering out like a broken wing.

Tears threaten to fall but I hold them back, fists clenched so hard my nails bite through the leather gloves and into my palms.

I gave him the choice to choose, between myself and our people. Between maintaining what little peace we've sustained with the grounders and starting another, relentless war.

It was a choice meant to test him.

And he chose wrong.


	15. Wanheda: Part Two

**Okay, so this isn't edited. Please ignore the mistakes and any redundant phrases I may have included. I always forget to edit, so here's a heads-up. Please review!**

"The moonshine's improved," I lie, swirling the clouded liquid around in the glass. It's the first time I've ever seen an actual bar outside of books, and though the options are limited, people sit around the scattered tables and on makeshift chairs. There's a piano in the left corner I instantly recognize.

My mood blackens. It hasn't improved much either since the argument with Bellamy, and though a couple hours have passed, I still haven't seen him. I spent that time with my mom, answering her questions, asking about the camp. Most of it was half-hearted on my part, but I tried, and for my mom, it seemed like enough.

"Yeah, right," says Octavia, who sits in the chair opposite of me, forearms on the table.

I take a small sip of the liquid. It burns on the way down. She has her own cup but, I notice, doesn't drink it.

We've been sitting here for a handful of minutes, in silence, and it's starting to weigh.

Thankfully, Octavia breaks it first. "So when do you hit the road?" she asks, leaning back and staring across at me. I detect traces of anger, and even if I didn't in her voice, I would in her eyes, a look that tells me she's pissed.

I act like I don't notice, focusing my attention on the liquor and the table and the room around me. "Not yet," I say ambiguously.

"How confidential of you," says Octavia. "And to think I almost expected a straight answer."

Yes, she's definitely angry with me.

I sigh and meet her eyes that are now narrowed. "I know what I'm doing, Octavia."

She grimaces. "Could've fooled me."

I was prepared today to take on only one Blake. Not two, and I can feel my earlier frustration with one blend into the second. "What do you want me to say?" I ask, almost pleadingly. "That I shouldn't have left? That I was a coward?"

"Yeah," Octavia deadpans, leaning forward again. "Yeah, I do."

I take a slow breath. "If I hadn't left, if I'd _been here,_ the Ice Nation would've shown up months ago, and used our vulnerability of post-war against us."

Octavia's hands tighten on the table. "It's convenient, isn't it?"

Now I'm angry. I'm angry at her and myself and the whole ruined world. "I didn't come here for this," I say calmly and stand.

Octavia follows suit, jumping to her feet. "Then what did you come back for? You say they'll come, but that's only because you're the one leading them to us."

 _Not to you,_ I want to say, but don't. Other people are looking towards us and I don't want to start a scene, even though I feel dangerously close to shouting. I try to calm my breathing as I look at her, the first sky person to touch the ground. That sky person is gone. She's torn off her wings and exchanged them for Grounder gear instead.

"I have a plan," I tell her coolly.

Her eyes narrow more. "Care to include the rest of us in on that?"

"It's . . . confidential," I say, not to mock her, but judging by the coldness that appears in her eyes, she takes it as such.

"Screw you, Clarke," she snaps, and starts walking away.

But I still need to ask one thing. "Octavia!" I call after her, and she pauses long enough for me to get out my question. "Have you seen Bellamy? I need to talk to him." I have to smooth over our earlier agreement, if not for the simple reason of not being hated by both Blakes at the same time.

She turns, just enough for me to see her profile. "He's probably with Gina, in the lab."

I frown. "Who's Gina?"

"His girlfriend," Octavia says bluntly. "Seems after you went AWOL, my brother and her got pretty close."

The thought of Bellamy with a girl, in that sense, actually makes my mind go blank, because I can't picture it. During our time spent in the One Hundred's camp, he was nefarious for one night stands. But now . . .

"I didn't know," I say.

Octavia looks back at me, a hard look in her eyes. "Our lives didn't stop when you left, Clarke," she says, before turning away and disappearing down the corridor.

She's right, I know. People move on. They keep going. They change. Like Bellamy has, having gone from rebel to leader. Like Octavia has, from sky girl to grounder. Like I have, from honor student, to criminal. From Princess, to warrior.

From doctor, to the Commander of Death.

* * *

It's a little while after Octavia leaves when another familiar face enters the bar.

I'm still seated at the same table, Octavia's abandoned glass still full. I'm not about to drink it; I want my head clear.

But when I glance up and find Jasper ordering moonshine, I know he doesn't share my concerns.

Gone is the joker who used to laugh around the bonfire. Gone are his boyish smiles and his enthusiasm he once carried that gave him so much life. In his place stands someone hollow and broken. Someone utterly unrecognizable.

I stare at his back and I think he must feel it because when he's handed his cup, he turns, and his eyes meet mine.

He stops.

Everything in me goes cold. I stand, wanting to move. To do something. But this isn't like with Bellamy. You can't plan what to say to the loved ones of the people you murdered.

Jasper's hair has been cropped short and there's a perpetual slump to his shoulders. His eyes are wide and the hand holding the cup tightens until his fingers turn white. He turns abruptly to leave.

"Wait, Jasper," I get a step from my table before he whirls on me.

The ice in his eyes, the _hate,_ is enough to knock the breath from my lungs. "No," he says, eyes boring into me. "I have nothing to say to you."

"I know. I just . . ." I stumble, the guilt mounting. People are glancing over at us, but I don't look at them. I keep my gaze on Jasper and the hand that's at risk of breaking the glass. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry about Maya"—

"You don't get to say her name!" Jasper roars, spilling his drink. He jabs a hand in my direction. The surrounding people are definitely watching now. "You don't get to speak about her. She was your friend. She helped you." Jasper's eyes glazed over. "And you killed her for it."

It's a punch in the gut. Because he's right.

My eyes well, but I squash it all down, burying it deep, deep inside me. I swallow the lump in my throat. "I didn't have a choice."

"You could've trusted me and you didn't." He shakes his head and gives me a look of pure disgust. "Go away, Clarke. Better yet, just leave. It's what you're good at."

He looks away from me and sense tells me to walk away. Let it go and give him time, like Bellamy said. But there's another part, one that wants to fix this. And it wins.

I take another step, close enough to make Jasper pause. "I tried," I say. "I _tried_ to stop it. I tried to reason with Cage! But he wouldn't listen, and I had to choose between us or them. People would've died either way. I would've sentenced them to death _either way."_

Jasper stares at me, his eyes pointed daggers drilling into my head, my heart. From the corner of my eye, I think I catch sight of Bellamy entering the bar, but my focus is on Jasper, still clutching the glass that refuses to break.

Then he does something completely unexpected.

He laughs.

It's just a low chuckle, but there's something maniacal in the sound. In the way his eyes go unfocused. He raises a glass like he's going to give a toast. "Maybe you're right," he jeers. "Maybe you didn't have a choice. After all, it's not your fault that people tend to die when they're around you." He chuckles again, glancing around the room. But when his eyes land on me again, his expression goes serious. "I guess they had it coming to them, for keeping company with the Angel of Death."

It's so close. So painfully close to the truth. I'm not just Wanheda to the grounders. I'm Wanheda to everyone.

Those tears come again and I blink rapidly.

"Stop," barks a voice, and I was right when I thought I spotted Bellamy, because he's suddenly between me and Jasper. Bellamy faces him, his voice hushed from where I am. "Pull yourself together . . ." he tells him, but the rest of his words are drowned out when I turn on my heels and leave the bar behind.

I keep walking, past the stares that trail after me. The corridor outside the bar is darker, casting me in traces of shadow but I don't stop. I can't.

I keep walking, distantly noting as the floor changes from grated metal to the crunch of dirt. Evening has fallen and a cold wind nips at my clothes. A few people mill around me so I take a sharp left to avoid them, stopping beside the exterior of the Ark. Something in me wants to scream or hit something, but I don't. On the contrary, I stand perfectly still, the look on Jasper's face playing over and over in my mind.

It's still playing when someone disrupts the gravel behind me.

"Told you he needed time," comes Bellamy voice, firm but not accusing. I'm glad I don't hear any pity in it.

I nod, shifting to face him. Evening casts most of his face in shadow, but I can make out his eyes, reflecting off the fires littered throughout the camp.

 _"I guess they had it coming to them,"_ Jasper's words ring back to me, _"for keeping company with the Angel of Death."_

"I know, I just . . . wanted to try."

There's still a tangible tension between us, but I act like I don't feel it as Bellamy takes a step closer. "I saw Octavia leaving the bar." A knowing look comes into those gleaming eyes. "How'd that go over?"

I smirk dryly, but it disappears a second later. "As well as could be expected." I shrug, glancing at the dirt flecked with pebbles. "She has a right to be upset. They all do. You included."

"I didn't exactly try to stop you from leaving, Clarke."

"That wasn't your job," I say.

"Do you regret it?"

I look up at him again. At his pursed lips and the line between his brows. The memory of me walking away surges, playing out like a film. The pleading in his eyes. The way it felt as I turned my back to him and everyone else.

"Yes, and no," I answer honestly. "I needed to leave, but I regret staying away for as long as I had."

"Then why did you?" asks Bellamy, an almost desperate look in his eyes, like he needs to know. "Before you knew you were being hunted. Why?"

I give a small shake of my head, staring up at him in earnest. "Because I knew I could. Because they had you."

The tightness in his face evaporates and I think some of the color leaves his cheeks, but it's hard to tell in the lowlight. He seems to struggle with a response, and finally settles for a sharp nod.

The tension is still there, but it's not as taught as it was before and I want to stay here, like this with him, not bickering, not talking of war. Just being, in the sparse moments of peace we're given.

So it surprises me, when I'm the one who shatters it. "Octavia told me about Gina," I say, a little hesitantly.

Bellamy's eyes flash with surprise and something else I can't name. Then it's gone. "You'd like her," he says. "She's stubborn, like someobody else I know."

That gets a smile out of me. "I'm . . ." I struggle for the right words, gazing back at him. "I'm glad you found someone, Bellamy."

He fidgets, disturbing a stray pebble. "You could too, you know," he says. "Finn would . . . want you to be happy."

An ache starts up, deep in my chest. The familiar pang of guilt. Because whenever I've allowed myself to think of Finn, the boy who went on illegal spacewalks, the man who gunned down a village and gave himself over as punishment, that's the first thing I feel. Not the sadness, or the terrible emptiness that comes with losing someone you care about. Just guilt.

"Maybe," I say, because it's all I can manage.

Bellamy and I lapse into silence. I watch Bellamy clench and unclench his hands, grappling with something I can't see. Then he steps forward, eyes just as pleading as they'd been on the day I left him.

"I know what you're thinking, Clarke," he says. "You're thinking that if you turn yourself over to the Ice Nation, you'll prevent a war. But you won't be enough to satisfy them for long. They'll come back for something else. For resources. For whatever else they'll see as a threat." Bellamy steps close until there's only a couple feet between us, gaze boring into my face. "So I'm asking you to drop this. Drop your plan and help us come up with a better one. Please."

I see it, the worry in his dark eyes. The hint, however small, of fear I glimpse tucked inside. The sight sends a different kind of pang through me. "Okay."

His hand latches onto my wrist, gentle but firm. "Promise me."

I stare back at him, the heat of his callused fingers branding me. All of those promises flash through my mind again, one by one, littered around me like pulverized glass. He's right about the Ice Nation; they won't be satisfied forever. And perhaps I can't prevent a war entirely. But I can give them something that no one else can: I can give them time.

So I raise my chin just a fraction, and push down my guilt until Bellamy can't see anything other than the conviction in my eyes. "I promise," I say.

It's broken before it's even made.


	16. Between Us: Part One

**Long time no see! Sorry for my lack of updates; I've been busy and have had computer problems which is one reason why nothing else has been updated. Last night though I got inspiration for a three-part (four-part?) story that takes place right after season 4. I still have yet to see the finale, but I know the gist and this is just something I picture happening between Clarke and Bellamy. So this is part one. Pleaaase review and if I have any details incorrect (such as the year which I randomly chose) please let me know!**

 _3019\. -Two months after death wave-_

She sits on the stool, elbows on the desk, gaze roving over the screens that reflect in her blue eyes. The computers have a lot to say, but she doesn't speak their language, not like Raven. She's learned some, though, enough to read between the lines; she knows radiation levels have not decreased since the death wave hit, sixty-nine days ago. She knows the bunker may have suffered damage, due to the severed radio connection and how her end only ever delivers a white static. Based off her scans, she knows there's no definitive way to be positive of her immunity to radiation. She doesn't need the computers to tell her she is running low on rations.

She takes a deep breath and grabs the radio head. Her pulse used to quicken when she pressed the receiver down. After a month of silence, it stopped doing that.

"This is Clarke Griffin," she says, feeling her voice bound about her, hollow. "It's day sixty-nine, and radiation levels still show no change. I've tried to contact the bunker, but without any luck." Clarke stops for a moment, just long enough to think about her next words. If she can bear them. "I don't know if they're alive," she whispers, "But I hope they are. I hope you are, Bellamy." Now she stops abruptly and drags in a deeper breath, one that burns her lungs. She clears her throat before continuing. "I'm fine on rations for now, but they won't last much longer. Anyone listening knows what that means." She pauses, as if letting the ghost of static fill in the space of someone's reply. She swallows tightly. "That's it," she says quietly. "I'll update again tomorrow."

She sets the radio back on the desk with a dull _thud._

* * *

"Raven, you have to fix it."

"We've been over this, Blake. I _can't._ We're two thousand miles above the Earth's atmosphere. An atmosphere that is currently uninhabitable, courtesy of the end-of-the-world-take-two. Besides, no radio is operable through the amount of radiation that takes every frequency and plays jump rope with it."

Bellamy runs his fingers through his hair and clenches his jaw so tight, his jaw aches. Sixty nine days. Sixty nine days of being sealed back inside a metal world with seven other people, some of who he doesn't even like. And those of who he does, he finds himself liking less after two months kept within a three-hundred yard radius of one another.

For days, tensions have been on the rise, between Murphy and Monty, Emori and Echo. _Himself_ and Echo. This ship is a condensed version of the Ark, but at least on the Ark there were quiet places to go. There had been _privacy._ Here it is harder to afford. At least, if feels like it. There are no woods to lose himself in. No streams to wash off a day's work. No _life_ beyond the seven beings inside. As it turns out, it is easier to be born behind walls than to be forced back into them and after living under an endless sky, the ship is starting to feel less like their hope and more like their tomb. The sensation of feeling trapped is starting to put Bellamy's teeth on edge.

Particularly now, when his feelings of helplessness threaten to overwhelm his frustration. "You're the one who got the rocket _up_ here," he grinds, standing beside Raven as she moves from screen to screen, eyes darting from one to the other in quiet assessment. "You were the one who said a hundred things could go wrong but we _found a way_ to survive on this ship. And now you're telling me there is absolutely nothing we can do to salvage our connection with the others?"

Raven sighs and drops her shoulders. She keeps her gaze on the screen though, but Bellamy doesn't need to see to know she's no longer reading it. "There's only one thing we can do," she says.

He makes the mistake of feeling hopeful. "What is it?"

Raven looks at him, brown eyes resolved. "We wait."

Bellamy grinds his teeth and looks away, staring at one of the screens relaying radiation levels on Earth. No change. "You heard the same thing I did," he says. "She's running out of time." Only weeks ago was it when he first heard her voice, after a month spent believing that she was dead. He doesn't want to mourn her a second time. He can't.

"Clarke's smart," Raven says, returning to her test runs and readings. "She'll figure something out."

But Bellamy does not miss the doubt in her voice any more than he missed it in Clarke's.

* * *

"Day ninety-two. Radiation levels are the same. No contact has been made between me and the bunker, or the ship for that matter." Clarke lets her gaze wander to the stairs. "I'm . . . almost at my last ration, so I guess I'll be taking a walk soon." she shuts her eyes for a moment, biting her lip just hard enough to make herself wince. "I'll be using one of the suits to see if gradual exposure makes any difference. If not . . . Bellamy, if you're listening, I want you to know that it's okay. And thank you. For not waiting. You did what you had to. I know you'll help keep everyone safe." She takes a deep breath, "May we meet again."

With that, she replaces the radio and stands. The suit she wears makes her movements slow, the color of a sleet grey sky and bearing the same weight as it. She grabs the helmet from the desk and sets it back over her head, trying to tell herself she may not be walking to her death. That there is hope. But if she can't contact anyone, what good will it do her?

When Clarke reaches the door, she checks again to make sure she has not forgotten the small knife. No, it is still there, tucked in her belt, waiting. Ready. She pulls it out and stands a little straighter, facing a slate world, sucked of any color and light. A graveyard. With shaky, gloved hands, Clarke unlocks the door and pulls it open.

A blast of freezing air hits her, so cold it chills her blood. She walks down the small flight before stepping on dirt. Or, what once was dirt. For the first time since the death wave, Clarke is outside. Nd for a dismal moment, she allows herself to see what has become of her world for the second time. The river is gone. The trees are ash. The ground is pulverized into a black dust that clings to the soles of her shoes. North, South, East and West coalesce into confusion. Every direction displays the same dead picture, until Clarke has to remind herself to breathe.

She squeezes her eyes shut until white explodes behind her lids. Her grip on the knife tightens enough to remind her and a calm sweeps past. Keeping her eyes closed, Clarke lifts the knife to her helmet. She aims the tip at the seam running beneath her jaw. And against the black canvas of her eyelids, she reassembles the world as it used to be. Wild foliage rich in blue and purple flowers, spattering hillsides and infusing the air with the smell of pine after a light rain. She thinks of the bubbling brook, folding over rocks and disappearing in a jump over the falls. She draws it like she remembers, willing it back into existence as she catches the fabric of her suit with the knife, and rents it open.

* * *

He can't breathe. The space is too small, the concave walls bearing down on him like he is caught in a massive hand that is slowly squeezing into a fist. On the other side of the radio is just silence. Clarke has nothing more to say and he thinks she has left. Which pisses Bellamy off for about the umpteenth time that he can't respond. That he is forced to sit and _listen_ to this. Guilt eats away at him, heating his blood until he wants to move but there is nowhere for him to go. _I should've given her more time,_ he thinks. He thinks it every day, every morning her voice comes on the radio. A hundred times more at the possibility of never hearing it again.

He also knows he would have done the same thing over, if he had to.

The door to the small cell he is tucked away inside rattles. The side of it is mangled from the landing, making it impossible to seal from the outside.

Bellamy doesn't even need to look to know who it is; they each know one another down to the simple rhythm of their footsteps.

"What is it, Monty?" He asks, a bite to his words.

Monty stays at the door, looking in on the man seated on the ground over pictures depicted in pencil, of trees and spring water, flowers and sunsets and things that are now nothing more than ash. "Raven asked me to check in on you."

Bellamy says nothing, letting his silence be his answer.

"How's she doing?"

Bellamy's grip over the radio tightens. _How do you think?_ He almost responds. Instead he pulls in a tired breath. "Not good." He doesn't give voice to the possibilities painting out terrible scenarios in his mind. Clarke in trouble. Clarke in pain. Clarke dead. At least he knows his sister is okay, whether that be in a bunker under rubble or not. She has the others and she's _safe._ Clarke has no one, and she is outside.

Monty lingers by the door, as if debating whether or not to say something. After a few empty moments, he risks it. "Maybe you should stop doing this to yourself, Bellamy. It's only making things worse for you."

This time Bellamy looks at him, shoving away his anger. He knows Monty's words come from a good place, but that doesn't make them any more welcome. "Tell Raven I'll be here if she needs me."

"Bellamy-"

"Was there something else you needed?"

Monty stares at him, monolid eyes sad. They still hold the loss of Jasper in them, open and heavy, like a wound that hasn't healed properly. Maybe they never do.

He gives a brusquely nod. "Guess that's it." He leaves, shutting the door quietly behind him.

Bellamy returns his attention to the radio, as if willing Clarke's voice to reappear on the other side of it. He imagines her walking alone, two thousand miles beneath his feet.

An hour passes. Two. But he doesn't leave. He waits, feeling his heart fall down the rungs of his ribs the longer her silence drags out.

 _C'mon, Clarke,_ he begs. _Say something. Come back._

But the silence continues until he changes his mind and he decides he would have risked waiting for her after all.

* * *

The wind burns.

It's like the air cannot decide if it's hot or freezing, so it has become both, a breath of ice one moment before it heats into a vapor fire that caresses Clarke's cheeks and makes her skin boil.

Her breath turns to lead. Her lungs burn until she can't fill them anymore and the world becomes a watercolor mess that runs black and grey. Her boot sinks into the ground and she loses her footing. The impact rubs against her flaming skin and she thinks she screams.

 _Inside!_ Her mind shrieks. _Get inside!_

Clarke fumbles forward to a crawl, breathing in small spurts. The stairs swim before her and she strains for the first, clamoring up on her hands and knees. A coppery tang fills her mouth.

 _Not yet,_ she thinks. _Not yet, not yet._

She is almost at the top and struggles to the door, gloved hand outstretched before her, eyes fixed just beyond her fingertips. A small ember inside her flares to life. _Fight,_ it demands, _Keep fighting._

But the ember fades as quickly as it is born, and Clarke doesn't remember if she reaches it or not.

* * *

Nearly seven hours have passed since Clarke last spoke on the radio. That's four-hundred-and-twenty minutes of empty radio static. Of possibilities that come to Bellamy so fast they trip over one another in their haste to be the forefront. But they all end the same way, with Clarke's silence.

He rubs his eyes and pinches the bridge of his nose; runs a hand through his hair. Raven has stopped by once to ensure everything was still accounted for. She only needed to look at his face to know what Clarke had decided to do and to also know she had yet to respond. Raven told him to give her more time. Maybe she reached the bunker. Maybe she couldn't carry the radio. Maybe a lot of things but the loudest of them all, turning up in volume until Bellamy's ears were ringing with it. _She's not immune. She's dead._

They still ring with it, delivering Bellamy a dull headache he's almost grateful for.

He brushes his fingertips over the drawing of trees, smudging the lead with the pad of his thumb. Again he tries to imagine a golden-haired girl angled over the floor as she brings the walls of her prison to life with nothing more than a stub of pencil.

Bellamy leans his head against the wall and shuts his eyes, building a wall against the onslaught of if's and shouldve's, wishes and maybe's that continue to bombard him.

 _C'mon, Clarke,_ he thinks one last time. _I haven't given up on you yet._

And he still doesn't, not even when seven hours stretch taught into eight. Not when the dull headache turns into a cranial pound. Not when sleep nearly overtakes him, and only the faint crackle of static jars him back.

His breathing stops. He holds the radio in still fingers, his gaze locked on a drawing of flowers sprouting by the door. He waits.

"I'm alive," Clarke's voice rasps from the speaker.


	17. Between Us: Part Two

**I'm actually considering making this into its own fanfiction, because I honestly have no idea how long it is going to be. Would anyone be interested in that? The chapter lengths are also going to vary. I'm having fun with it (also, after that finale, I'm slightly pissed and this offers a productive outlet). Also, this is unedited. Also, also, if there's a particular exchange you would like to see, please mention it and/or review!**

She has run out of bandages. The white linen is stained, balled up at the bottom of a waste basket. Just as well; they don't seem to be helping her much and the suit just ruins the ones she's already applied.

It takes nearly three weeks before everything begins to heal and she can actually speak without gritting her teeth against the nails dragging down the chalkboard of her throat.

Clarke doesn't remember reaching the lab, only what came after, when she woke up inside it. She doesn't have to have any medical training to know there will be scars. They're already showing, blooming like white poppies over her skin. As if they're a primary concern of hers. She nearly scoffs. No, being able to tolerate radiation was only part of the bigger issue at hand. Now there are greater obstacles to face, like the most immediate one of her having finally reached her last ration. It's tasteless in her mouth and chafes at her raw throat.

She swallows the last of it and picks up the radio, weighing it in her palm. After a moment, she lifts it to her lips and thumbs the receiver. "Day one-hundred-and-ten. Sorry it's been over two weeks since I last updated. I've been . . . A little preoccupied."

A part of her relaxes into the comfort of this familiarity, as she imagines the face of the man hearing her words. Praying he hears them. "Radiation levels are the same. Not much of a surprise there. On the brighter side, I'm not dead, which leads me to believe the Nightblood treatment worked. I have to test it again today. If I want to live, I mean. The rations are gone so it's time for me to start improvising." She stops for a breath before continuing, gauging the details she should relay. "Still no word from the bunker. If everything works out, I'll be able to travel over there soon. I'll check for damages on the outside, make sure it's all still sealed so you can be confident Octavia and the others are safe." The image of her mom flashes through Clarke's mind and she squeezes her eyes shut against the pain. How much she wishes she'd gotten the chance to say goodbye. To say more the last time she saw her. To have hugged her mother for a heartbeat longer.

Clarke shakes off the thought; buries it among the other needless wishes that are dust in her hands.

She opens her eyes again. "I hope things are going well up there. That it's not too hard to be without the sky. It's not an appealing sight anymore, if that's any consolation. You can't even see the stars." She leans her head against the seat, looking up at the ceiling as if picturing the vastness of space beyond it. "Trust me," she murmurs wistfully, her voice floating about her in the stillness. "I've tried."

* * *

It takes seventeen days for her voice to appear again.

Within that time, Bellamy nearly believes her to be dead. Again. But after doubting her the last time, he holds onto whatever faint glow of hope he has that she is alive today.

He tries to keep busy, doing his normal rounds, pulling his workload, making his daily check-ins to ensure their tiny metal world is not in jeopardy of falling apart. Inside him though, right between his ribs is a fist of nervous energy, unraveling more and more until a bite has appeared in his tone and his hands are perpetually clenched at his sides. The others take notice but they don't ask, already knowing what it's about. They all work, and Bellamy's fear gets a little louder, a little more tangible with every day that passes.

 _Maybe something went wrong._

 _Maybe she's not immune._

 _Maybe she's really gone this time._

Maybe she's really gone this time.

But he doesn't give up, and it is then that he hears it, the usual time he drops into the cell for a moment of quiet. The moments that used to be filled with her voice. One second there is nothing. In the next, the radio crackles, and Bellamy drops by the metal box, scrambling for the speaker. Everything in him pulls taught, an arrow ready to fly. He shuts his eyes. _Please. Please._

 _"Day-one-hundred-and-ten. Sorry it's been over two weeks since I last updated. I've been . . . preoccupied."_

Bellamy let's out a breath he's been holding for seventeen days and his relief actually makes him smile. He rests his back against the wall, radio in hand, taking in the fact that she's alive. There's a strain in her voice that tells him not everything is all right, but she's breathing, and for him that's good enough.

 _"Radiation levels are the same. On the bright side, I'm not dead . . ."_ Bellamy listens to her update, trying to shove away his worry at the mention of her diminished supply. She may be immune, but not even Luna tried to consume materials with those levels of radiation. The end of the world changes a lot, and there is no guarantee Clarke's reaction will even mirror Luna's. But it's not like she has any alternative.

Bellamy presses a fist to his forehead, hating again that all he can do is listen to her struggle. But it's more bearable than her silence.

For the most part.

He listens as she tells him how she plans to go after the bunker. _Don't do anything stupid,_ he wishes he could tell her.

 _"I hope things are going well up there,"_ she continues. _"That it's not too hard to be without the sky."_

 _I miss the land more,_ he concedes.

 _"It's not an appealing sight anymore, if that's any consolation."_

 _It's not._

 _"You can't even see the stars."_ He hears the small catch in her voice. _"Trust me, I've tried."_

Bellamy pulls himself to his feet, taking the radio with him. He shoves aside the battered, metal door and enters a stretch of corridor, coming to a stop before a window that displays a cluster of novas, burning like candles in the dark.

 _They're still here,_ he thinks. _Trust me._


	18. Haunted: part one

**Okay, so, this will be a three-part one-shot (three-shot?) where we get to see a little bit of post Primfaya on the Ring through Bellamy's eyes. I'll explain what's happening to him in the follow-up chapters. And I apologize in advance, because this one shot probably won't be happy. Please review!**

Bellamy couldn't seem to look away from the burning world. They were safe, hung back up in the stars, breathing recycled air, as below him the Earth died. The brightness stung his corneas, but he wouldn't look away. He stayed, and he waited, and he watched.

 _You have such a big heart, Bellamy. But you have to use this too._

Bellamy shut his eyes. Then he turned on his heels, putting his back to the burning world, and walked away.

* * *

The sound of a hammer against a steel rod shattered the quiet of the room. "This isn't working!" Monty said, wiping away the sweat with the back of his hand. He held it there, as if unprepared to look the others in the eye.

Raven let out a long, quiet sigh. "It's...it's a temporary problem. Nothing we can't fix."

Monty looked at them. "And what if we can't? I know you want to believe that we _can_ fix everything, but we might have to start looking for alternatives here, if there are any at all."

Bellamy crossed his arms over his chest. "That's not an option. We're getting the algae station up and running. You're just gonna have to try again."

"And if that doesn't work?" There wasn't anger in his voice, just resignation at that single question they'd all asked themselves at least once. He was just the first to ask it aloud.

"Then we try again, and again, until we do." Bellamy crouched down and scooped up the hammer. He stood, and extended it back to Monty. "We didn't come this far to die here. We won't. So let's get back to work."

Monty looked at him a long moment before silently taking the hammer from him. "For Clarke," he said quietly.

Bellamy ignored that sharp pain in his chest, and nodded. "For all of us."

* * *

When he slept, he dreamed. Sometimes good things, of sunlight and the smell of rain, the feel of warmed dirt under bare feet. Of a bright blue sky instead of a rich black one spattered with flecks of light.

But then there were times that the dreams weren't so sweet, when all he dreamed of was the dark.

And her. He tried not to, but he dreamed of her.

And yet, no matter what he he dreamed, he always woke with the same hollowness. He always woke feeling a loss, whether that be of sunlight or fresh water or friends. But the ones of her were the hardest, because though he would have the sunlight and his sister again, things would be irreversibly different.

Tonight was one of those nights. The hallowness gnawed on Bellamy as he tried to rub the images in his eyes away. The steel floor was ice against his feet but he didn't bother putting on his shoes as he stood and left his room. Walking helped clear his head. It gave him something to do, because after Monty had managed to get the algae station working, there were less distractions to keep Bellamy's mind occupied. Raven was concerned one of the CO2 scrubbers had busted a leak, but it was nothing he could help with, which gave way to the silence, the freedom to think of things, and there were a great deal of things Bellamy didn't want to think of. So he walked. He explored all he could of the Ring. Tonight, he went to the skybox. Cell 23B. On the left. He knew it was Octavia's since a few months after her incarceration, and it was the closest he could get to his sister now, even if she was a different person when she last occupied it. That girl was young and untouched by war, who ran towards butterflies instead of into battles. Now that girl was gone, and Bellamy knew the next five years would change her again.

Bellamy stayed until the pain of missing her dulled a fraction and his back hurt from sitting on the floor. Usually he didn't bother with the other cells because he knew he wouldn't be able to tell who was in them last, but the time in Octavia's was chafing against the hollowness, and he didn't want to return to his room quite yet. So he started down the hall he once walked as a guard. This was where the Hundred began. Not long ago, these cells belonged to them. In one of these cells was where Charlotte used to be, where Atom and Wells used to spend every moment until they were carted off to the dropship and sent to the ground. One was Jasper's, one used to be Monroe's.

Somewhere, one was Clarke's.

Bellamy thought he wouldn't be able to tell which was hers. Maybe he'd passed it already. Maybe it was on the other side of the hall.

But then something in his periphery caught his eye, something dark in one of the cells. For a moment, he thought it was shadows. It wasn't until Bellamy stepped inside that he realized the shadows weren't shadows but pencil lines.

Drawings. Everywhere. They covered the walls in uniform depictions of trees and waterfalls, shorelines and sunsets. Earth. And there were faces, too. A man's took up a piece of wall, his face kind, eyes bright. Beside him was a woman's face, and even without the small inscription beneath his dating the death of Jake Griffin, Bellamy recognized the woman beside him. The last time he'd seen her, Bellamy had made her a promise. A promise to keep her daughter safe. A promise he couldn't keep.

That hollowness flared. The weight of the room seemed to press the air from his lungs, because of course this was her cell. It was diplomatic rebellion, hope penned on prison walls. Bellamy could picture her on the floor, hands and knees smudged in pencil lead.

Before Bellamy realized it, his own hand was lifted to one of her drawings, as if pulled by some invisible force, his fingertips brushing across a treeline. The small bit of lead that came onto his fingers told him that they were no figment of his imagination.

"Clarke," he whispered into the stillness. His fingers tightened into a fist against a sunset. It reminded him of how the Earth looked to burn.

He almost wished he were in a war right now. On a battlefield. Anywhere that filled up the silence with survival. Now he had no distractions keeping his ghosts away. He would relive the grounder massacre, his sister's face when she returned without Lincoln. He would remember Nylah and the father he took from her, Gina and the blind trust that killed her. He would remember twenty-six of the worst fatalities, when children died so that they could live.

And he would remember her, the only person who understood him and believed in him. The only person he had who forgave what he couldn't. Who, somehow, still saw a good heart in the aftermath of his most monstrous moments. Who died, so that none of them had to.

Bellamy tried to breathe past the pain filling the hallowness, making the hole in him wider. None of it should have happened like it did. Everything was preventable. That grounder army didn't have to be slaughtered. He could've stopped it. Gina didn't die. He could've stopped it. Lincoln didn't have to die. He could've stopped it.

Clarke didn't have to die. She didn't have to die. They were so close. Ten minutes from survival. If only he'd gone to the satellite instead.

"You deserve to be here, Clarke," he said in the emptiness of the cell. "It should've been you." It was all horribly comical when he thought that he never even planned on surviving. He'd planned on Clarke surviving. Had put her name down himself, because she was important and they needed her.

"I need you," he said faintly. "I needed you here." After everything, it was terribly wrong for only one of them to come out alive. Worse, was that the one was him. It should've been her.

"But you just had to got and be the hero," he said. She should've let him do it. "You didn't even get to say goodbye to your mom."

Or to any of them. She'd died. Alone.

"You're not just alive for you."

A jolt danced through Bellamy. Slowly, he turned around.

She stood by the cell entrance, looking exactly how he'd last seen her, just without the hazmat suit.

Bellamy stilled. He blinked. Again, when she didn't go. He took a very small step forward, eyes wide, his heart suddenly pounding.

"C...Clarke. You're-"

"Not really here," she answered. Her eyes were solemn, lips unsmiling, but there was something undeniably light about her. "I just . . . thought you might need someone to talk to."

Bellamy made a scoffing noise, choking on his own incredulity, on his grief. He reached out to touch her face, but it was as if his hand could never get there, even though she didn't move away.

He shook his head, bewildered. "This isn't . . ." _What, real?_ Maybe not, but maybe in that moment, he didn't need it to be. It certainly _felt_ real, even without him able to touch her. He could pretend she was here, and that was suddenly, vibrantly, enough.

"I-I'm sorry," he said. "We . . . I left you behind. I didn't . . . I didn't have a choice."

Her eyes softened to an almost unbearable degree. "I know. You did the right thing, Bellamy. I would have wanted you to go."

He grit his teeth. "Didn't make it easy. It was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do."

Clarke doesn't look at the cell. She doesn't look at her drawings, but keeps her eyes on Bellamy, as if it is only the two of them. "And the others are alive because of it."

Bellamy shook his head. "They're alive because of you."

"And you," she said. "We all helped save each other."

He lifted his hand again, fingers ready to brush a strand of blonde hair away from her face. "No one saved you."

"It was my choice."

"I wish it had been mine. It should've been me at that satellite. What even happened? Why'd it take so long?"

"I got held up."

He looked at her in disbelief, dropping his hand back to his side. "That's it?"

"Does it matter? I wouldn't have made it back in time, you know that. You spared every second that you could."

Bellamy tore his eyes away from her but kept her in his periphery, if only to make sure she stuck around. "That didn't make it right. None of this is _right!_ I don't belong here, Clarke." He looked back at her. "You did."

She shook her head, almost sadly. "I didn't have any more of a right to live than you, Bellamy."

"I think the 300 grounders I helped kill would have a different opinion."

"You thought you were protecting our people."

"So that made it right?"

"Is there anything we do in war that's right?"

Bellamy shook his head, as if to rid of her words. "I won't use that as an excuse to justify it."

"Then use it as a reminder of what not to do next time, no matter how bad things get."

Bellamy glanced away again, and his eyes landed on the drawing of her parents. "Someday...I'm gonna have to tell your mom what happened to you. She thinks you're here. She'll be waiting all that time for nothing."

A beat of silence passed between them, and for a second, Bellamy thought he'd hurt her. Could you hurt someone who wasn't even there at all? He was almost gratified by it.

"But Octavia won't be," replied Clarke. "My mom has Marcus. Your sister has you. And she's going to need you at the end of this, Bellamy."

"And your mom won't?"

At that, Clarke didn't answer.

Bellamy shifted back to her. "I once told you I didn't want to be angry at you anymore. But I still am. I'm angry at you for doing what you did. I'm angry at understanding why you did it, but I'm angrier that you were the one to do it at all, and that no matter how angry I get, you'll still be the one who's left down there instead of someone who actually deserves to be."

Her brows furrowed, as if his words had struck her. "You're right," she said. "It won't change anything. But I know you'll be okay. You have them, and they have you. And after all this, you're going to go back to the ground, and you're going to build things, not break them." She closes the gap between them, leaving just a slice of space between them. "You're strong, Bellamy, and you make others strong by being around you."

He stared into her eyes, wishing away her words. Wishing away a lot of things that wouldn't ever go. "I don't feel strong." What he really felt was broken.

She nodded. "But you are. I see it."

"You're the only one who does, and you're not even here."

She smiled, a sad smile that barely lifted the corners of her mouth. "If you weren't, do you think Monty would've kept trying to get the algae station working as hard as he had? Or that Raven would be half as positive without having someone reliable working beside her? You drive them, Bellamy, and it's that unfailing resolve that is going to get you all through this."

Bellamy shook his head."You were the one who was strong."

"Because I had you to help me be."

Bellamy stared at her fixedly, as if trying to remember her face, inscribe it indubitably into his memory. His vision suddenly blurs. "I'm scared, Clarke." Scared of being without her and her indomitable hope. Scared of being without the girl who acted as his head when his heart refused to listen. Scared to blink, only to find her gone.

Her own eyes grew wet. "I know."

He pursed his lips. "Can you . . . Are you able to stay?"

She might not have been real, but the hole in his chest had lessened enough until he could almost believe otherwise.

She held her smile. "I'll stay for as long as I can."


	19. Here and Alive

**This season, guys. And that last episode . . . who watched that scene more than once? After hearing there would be a hug (there ALWAYS HAS TO BE A HUG) I wanted to write it, because I don't have cable, but right after it airs, I'm going to Youtube the scene before I can watch it on Amazon tomorrow. I'm so ready. I've been ready. All the fanfiction I've written screams: R.E.A.D.Y. Now, I don't think what I've written here will happen exactly, I more just wanted to bring closure. Most-likely, some parts of this won't be addressed until later in the season, when Bellamy and Clarke (particularly Bellamy) move past the realization that the other is alive. Clarke always had that hope. The idea never really even occurred to Bellamy. So yeah, please tell me what you think. I'm so excited for this next episode. *Cue happy dance*  
**

* * *

"Take the collar off."

The words pierced through the haze, pulling Bellamy back from blue eyes and tangled blonde hair. The cup seemed to grow cold in his hands, like the ice those people were buried in.

Movement from behind Clarke caught Bellamy's attention, and his back stiffened, ready.

"What are you doing?" He asked, looking between the man moving toward Clarke, his skin the color of wet earth.

The man glanced at Bellamy as he lowered himself in front of Clarke, another barrier between the two of them. Dark fingers reached for her neck.

"Stop right there." Bellamy's hand tightened over the cup, until he was sure it would break. The rifle he had stowed under his jacket burned hot, an old friend.

The man didn't lower his hands. "I'm not going to hurt her," he said, as his fingers slipped behind Clarke's neck.

Bellamy took a step forward, looking between Clarke and the group of strangers. He saw one of them twitch.

"Don't do anything you'd regret," he said quietly. "You're not the only killers down here."

The woman tilted her chin, eyes calculative. "Two-hundred-and-eighty-three for one. That's some loyalty."

Bellamy clenched his teeth.

" _We didn't survive just to go back and do the same things again."_

But that was then.

A click drew Bellamy's gaze down to Clarke's neck as the man leveled before her removed a silver contraption, firelight catching on the metal and making it grin. Only then did Bellamy's eyes fall back on the damage it revealed, a torque of ugly red encircling Clarke's neck.

The moment it was gone, Clarke seemed to let out a silent breath of relief. The man held his hands out enough for Bellamy to see, collar hooked between his fingers as he turned back and met Bellamy's gaze. Words seemed to hang in his dark eyes, like he wanted to say something. Instead, he moved silently back into the group, and disappeared into the lowlight.

Bellamy took another step forward, his own hands raised. She was _right there,_ not a yard away from him, bright eyes staring up at him, just as disbelieving, just as relieved.

The sound of a bullet sliding into a barrel forced his gaze from Clarke to the woman again, the gun in her hand aimed nonchalantly at Clarke's head. "And what about my people?"

The cup's coldness seemed to leak into the rest of Bellamy, until he was ice, too. He was afraid. Afraid of losing someone he'd already spent the last six years mourning. Afraid of failing her a second time, and breaking a promise he made to a twelve-year-old girl.

Slowly, Bellamy shook his head. "Nothing will happen to your people."

A mirthless smirk ghosted the woman's face. "What proof of that can you give me? How do I know you won't kill them all the moment you take this one back?"

Bellamy swallowed. His hands were still, voice even, but he trembled on the inside, as he tried to keep the weight of everything away. Negotiate. How many wars had he been in? How many times had he been here?

 _How many times had he succeeded?_

 _No._ This was different. Everything was different.

"No one's dying today," Bellamy said calmly. "And unlike you, I don't actually want to kill your people. We just want peace, unless that's something you can't agree with us on."

"Tell that to the seven men this woman and her partner slaughtered."

Bellamy didn't blink. "We'll call it self defense."

"There's one thing you're forgetting. The valley's not big enough for all of us," a man beside the woman snapped. His face would be a mask of indifference, if not for the blue violence of his eyes.

Bellamy pursed his lips. "That's tomorrow's problem. Here." Slowly, Bellamy lowered his left hand to his belt, where the communications device was secured. He unclasped it and brought the receiver to his lips. "Raven, what's the status on the cryo chambers?"

A pause of static.

"Still two-hundred-and-eighty-three cases of cold feet. Nothing a little Vitamin D won't fix."

"Everything running okay?"

Static.

"I'm surprised you even felt the need to ask. It's not like Murphy's running this sky op solo."

"I'll take that as a yes."

Bellamy held up the device to the group. "Any questions, feel free to ask Raven. You want diagnostics run? Okay, then. Here's your proof." He glanced at Clarke, sharpening his next words to a brilliant point. "Take it or leave it."

Silence descended.

Bellamy looked away from Clarke and took in everyone else. It would take Raven only one button. One button, and hundreds died. Just like Mount Weather, just like the bunker. No one ever won. Some lived, too many died, and that was it.

 _Please, let it be different this time._

The woman's finger over the trigger flinched and Bellamy held his breath, the ice inside so cold it burned.

Her finger dropped from the trigger as she holstered her firearm. "Stand down."

The man with those warring eyes stepped towards her, as if he were already in battle. "Hold on. _Think_ about what you're saying. You're really going to believe everything this-"

Suddenly the woman was before the man, her nose nearly brushing his. "Right now, that's not really a risk I'm willing to take, unless you're willing to swap places with Kodiak?"

A muscle in the man's jaw fluttered, and he looked away.

"That's what I thought." Her eyes found Bellamy's again. "If I find out you're lying and a lot more is going on up there than you're telling me-"

"Then I'll turn myself in," Bellamy said.

That smirk returned. "Just like that?"

Bellamy raised his chin. "Just like that."

Carefully, like a hawk, she appraised him, eyes silently probing, seeing what only soldiers could. "Either you're telling the truth, or you're almost as good at lying as I am." She turned her head to the others and raised a hand. "Move out."

One by one, the throng of prisoners peeled away, melting into the woods until only the woman remained. She didn't say anything more; the look in her eyes was clear enough, a threat and a warning folded into a single glance. Then she stepped back into the treeline, and into the dark.

He should have waited longer. He should have made sure that no one was lingering. But the moment Bellamy looked back on Clarke, there was no such thing as waiting.

Tears had gathered in her eyes and Bellamy didn't realize his heart was pounding, a crash of bewilderment and _she's alive_ beating through his chest.

"Bellamy," Clarke whispered, her voice breaking.

And just like that, Bellamy found himself right before her, kneeling down until she was only a breath away. Everything seemed fragile, as if a single touch would make her collapse back into memory.

He lifted a hand to her face, his eyes burning. "Clarke."

Then Bellamy was touching her, letting the fragility of everything burst. With a choked sob, Clarke wrapped her arms around Bellamy's neck as his encircled her waist, pulling her to him until there was nothing left between them.

She pressed her face into the crook of his neck. "You're here." It came as a quiet gasp. "You're really here."

Bellamy's arms tightened and he shook his head in amazement. "You're alive. I thought-"

"It's okay," she rasped, voice thick with emotion. "It's-" a sharp intake of breath from her made Bellamy instantly loosen his hold. "What is it?"

Clarke leaned away enough for him to look her over. His eyes lingered on the chafed flesh of her neck, the sight kindling his anger. But when his gaze skipped farther down, he realized her neck wasn't the only source of pain.

"You're bleeding," he said, taking in the sight of black blood spreading across her side. His own fingertips were slick with it.

Clarke took a steady breath. "It's-just a flesh wound. It'll be fine." She cast a glance from over his shoulder. "Where are the others? Did they-?"

"They're fine," he said. "Madi's fine. Raven and Murphy are on the Eligius ship. We needed the leverage."

With gingerly fingers, Bellmy peeled back the damp fabric, just enough to expose the wound. It wasn't big, but it was deep.

"You thought it was Octavia," Clarke said, her voice hushed. "Didn't you?"

Bellamy's hand over her stilled. He met her somber eyes. "Madi said the bunker was still buried."

Clarke looked away as more tears escaped. "I couldn't dig them out. I tried. But the tower had collapsed over the entrance, and I couldn't do it. There was too much debris."

Pain slammed into Bellamy's chest, a different kind of wound. It fueled his anger, stoking it to a bonfire that lit his blood. He didn't spend six years in space to return to this.

"Hey," he said gently, reaching again for Clarke's face. "Look at me, Clarke."

She did.

"You did everything you could. _We . . ._ we should've been here. It's no one's fault."

Clarke nodded, and a light seemed to fill those eyes. "They could still be there. There are resources now. Raven-"

"Could help us find what we need to blow off the debris," he finished.

For the first time in six years, Bellamy saw Clarke smile. "Octavia wouldn't have given up. We know that."

At her words, Bellamy took a deep breath. That fire dimmed as his anger calmed. He nodded. Clarke was right. When had he ever known Octavia to give up?

Once more, Bellamy found his eyes returning to Clarke's face, taking it in again. It seemed to hit him freshly that she was really here. Different, yet the same. Harder, but stronger too. Six years hadn't taken her quiet confidence. It hadn't quelled her ability to reason. It hadn't denied her the capacity to still hope.

"Think you can walk?" he asked, his voice cracking. He cleared his throat.

"I think so."

With steady hands, Bellamy helped her to her feet, slipping a hand behind her back just to make sure. Her quiet hiss of pain made him clench his teeth. "You got it?"

Clarke nodded again. "Yeah." She looked up at him as they walked, as if still trying to grasp that he was here as much as she was. "Thank you, Bellamy."

Bellamy almost laughed, disbelieving. If anyone should be thanking anyone, it should be him. She was the one who had saved their lives. She had saved _his_ life. "What for? We . . ." He came to a stop. "I left you behind, Clarke."

She placed a hand on his shoulder. "You did the right thing."

"I know I did. But that didn't make it easier."

Clarke sighed. "Maybe it was better this way. I don't regret it, Bellamy. If I'd gone, Madi would've been alone and that"-her voice caught- "that's worse than anything else I could imagine."

Bellamy swallowed, staring at the person he'd spent six years missing, wishing he'd done _more_ for, wishing he could go back and just change something. How many times had he thought it should've been him instead? How many times had he wished for it?

"Thank you," he said now, his voice carrying in the quiet, "for saving us."

Clarke smiled. "Thank you for going, despite the cost." She let her hand drop to his, squeezing once before letting go. "And thank you, for coming back."


	20. When the Birds Fly

**Okay, first: I'm sorry. Now, this is just a theory I have for the ending of season 5. Not the final ending, but, like, a huge part of it. This took me awhile to write because I really wanted to make it as authentic as I could. Please read and review! Thank you :)**

* * *

He wished he'd never come to the ground.

That was his only clear thought, spiraling around the mayhem of silence in head, sawing through his teeth as an invisible weight bore down on his chest, cracking his ribs one by one.

His eyes were closed shut-Bellamy didn't want to open them. Didn't want to see, because once he did, that was it. There was no unseeing it. No rewinding time. No finding his way back to the stars.

He ground his teeth, hands clenched so hard they shook. The last time Bellamy was this terrified was when he was a boy, being handed something small and precious, with big, pure blue eyes and warm hands that wrapped themselves around his fingers.

But that was a better day. That was the day his life began.

Today . . . too many things had ended.

If only he hadn't come to the ground.

Slowly he dragged in a deep breath.

"Bellamy?"

" _Bellamy?" came her hushed whisper from between the metal slat, tiny fingers poking through the floor. "Can you tell me a story?"_

 _Bellamy was pulling back the steel piece before she could finish her question. Resting on his stomach against the floor, he peered over into the small wedge of space where a little form huddled, hopeful eyes peering at him, his own pieces of sky._

" _Which one, O?"_

 _She twirled a strand of dark hair. "Perseus."_

"Bellamy."

He opened his eyes.

So many things had changed. The world had ended, but nothing had ever felt so out of place until this moment, and no matter how hard Bellamy had tried, he couldn't put it back together.

He met flat eyes, like the color they used to be had faded, dulled to a cool steel. It was too different. Too wrong.

Then Bellamy's gaze drifted to the broken woman at his feet, brown hair shielding her face.

"You should've let her go when I offered, Bellamy. Traitors aren't welcome here."

The red in Bellamy's vision matched the red on the ground. He was unable to look away. Once again afraid to.

"What have you become, Octavia?" he asked quietly, his voice oddly even, like a part of him knew what the rest refused to accept.

But it was enough to make him finally see.

"Strong," she said, her footsteps silent over the grass. "United. You're looking for someone who doesn't exist anymore, Bel. Or haven't you realized that yet?"

A silent shudder ran through him, as he looked up. "I have now."

And he did.

If only they'd never come to the ground.

She raised a brow. "Then you know what it is I want."

Coldness seeped into Bellamy, the weight in his chest ripping through. "I have a very good idea."

Octavia took a step closer, eyes piercing. "But I know you'd die before you told me where she is."

"At least I haven't changed that much."

That raised a fire in her eyes. "You can't talk as if you know what it was like. You weren't _here_."

"No," he agreed. "Maybe if I had been, things would be different. Maybe _you_ would be different."

Octavia glanced toward the treeline. "We'll never know, will we?"

Bellamy looked down, and the sight of red filled his vision again. "Do you ever wonder . . .?"

"Wonder what?"

Bellamy raised his eyes back to Octavia. "What they would say, if they could see us now? Mom . . . Lincoln?"

His words were ice over the fire in her eyes, and Bellamy barely had time to blink before the sound of steel against steel cried, and Octavia was brandishing a sword. "Enough of this," she hissed. "I'll find her myself."

Deftly, Bellamy moved in front of her.

His actions were met with subtle surprise, indicated only by the rising of Octavia's brows. They quickly narrowed. "Get out of my way, Bellamy."

"You know I can't do that."

Her eyes flashed like a whip. With a flick of her wrist, she raised the sword. "Do you think that just because you're my _brother_ , it makes you immune to this?"

"No. When you . . . killed Echo," he flinched at the words, "you showed me that. If you cared about me at all, you wouldn't have touched her." He didn't look down again. "Seems you and Pike have more in common than you thought."

The barb found its mark, those eyes no longer pieces of sky but chips of ice. "If you ever mention him to me again, I'll-"

"What, you'll kill me?" Bellamy spread his arms wide. "So? An enemy of Wonkru is _your_ enemy, right? Then what are you waiting for?"

"Just tell me where the girl is, Bellamy!"

"You can't even see it, can you?" He practically shouted. "You're going after a child, O! Tell me how that makes you any different from Jaha floating our mother, or from Pike killing Lincoln? Tell me how that doesn't make you _worse_ than the both of them?"

He didn't feel it. The swipe was a brush, a hiss of air across his chin, just shallow enough to make blood run. Only moments later did he register the swift fire of pain trailing beneath his ear.

Across from him, the tip of Octavia's sword glimmered scarlet.

"I don't want to do this, Bellamy," she said. "But I will. If I have to." Her voice didn't waver, but there was a flash of something else there, something that was almost pleading. "You don't know half the things I've done."

Bellamy didn't wipe his neck. He could only stare at her, his emotions a swarm. "I believe it."

His words seemed to dig deep, and a flash of uncertainty crossed her face, a beat of visible, _real_ hurt lying fractured in those eyes. Maybe there was even some guilt. Suddenly she looked like the young girl he remembered, and in that moment, Bellamy felt her within reach, her small hands just beyond his grasp.

Then the comm at his waist crackled.

" _Bellamy, come in. Madi's disappeared in the woods, just south of the field. We need an update on Octavia,_ now-"

And those hands slipped away.

Octavia's gaze drifted beyond Bellamy.

The weight in his chest had become a boulder. He could barely breathe.

Silence filled the space, thick and cloying, a wire being pulled taut, until Octavia's eyes met Bellamy's once more.

And then she _moved._

In a blur of motion, Octavia dodged Bellamy, her lithe feet carrying her deftly across the expanse of grass. Evening was falling, casting long shadows against the field, reaching like dark fingers.

Bellamy didn't think; he just ran. "Octavia!"

She was a shadow in front of him, dipping in and out of his line of sight.

Bellamy forced his legs faster, his heart slamming against the broken pieces inside of him. This wasn't happening. He wouldn't _let_ it happen.

"Octavia!"

There.

Jumping over the fallen trunk of a tree, Bellamy split to the left before taking a sharp right. He saw a head of dark hair before he collided with her.

Pain lit his back as he slammed into the ground and rolled, momentarily stunned. His temples pounded, eyes stinging. He lifted his head from where he was lying strewn on the ground.

Steel eyes were already on him, and he staggered to his feet, hands raised out as if to a wild animal. "I can't let you do this, O."

She pulled herself to a crouch, appraising him. "Want to fight me for real this time, big brother?"

He shook his head. "I never wanted to fight you."

"Well, we don't always get what we want."

Bellamy stared. He couldn't seem to stop doing that, too bewildered, too horrified at what had become of his little sister. "I'm sorry I wasn't there for you. But this isn't the way. Can't you understand that? You're hunting a _child,_ O. A child who's done nothing but survived."

" _How_ she survived," Octavia hissed, "Is what's tearing us apart. It's not her fault, but it's still a problem I have to deal with."

"By _killing her_?"

Her expression darkened. "By eliminating the source of our dissension."

Bellamy could barely comprehend what he was hearing. "Are you that thirsty for power?"

"It's not about power, it's about survival. A child can't lead us, Bel, and the longer she lives, the more defactors we'll have. It's one life for hundreds."

"And you think that justifies it?" He couldn't keep the bite out of his own voice.

"Justice has nothing to do with this. If it did, do you really think there would be eight hundred of us alive right now?" She looked at him from under thick lashes, slashing deep shadows across sharp cheekbones. "You'd have been fortunate to find anyone in that bunker."

Bellamy pursed his lips. "You aren't _in_ the bunker anymore, O."

"And you're not on the Ring. Or was six years all it took you for you to forget the cost of survival?"

Bellamy ignored the bite of her words. "You can make whatever excuse you want; I won't let you near, Madi. I can't let you do that to yourself."

Octavia must have lost her hold on the sword because this time she withdrew a different weapon, this one smaller. She fiddled with the short blade's tip, glancing between the gleaming edge and him. "This isn't something you can save me from, big brother."

"You're right." His voice broke, the realization haunting, the weight crushing. "I can't."

Lithe as a lion, she stepped forward, drawing a quick uppercut. Bellamy ducked just in time, snatching up a loose branch and blocking her next blow. With him pinned, Octavia tried to move around him, but Bellamy managed to turn and knock her feet out from under her.

It was a short reprieve.

In one fluid motion, the both of them were back on their feet, Octavia watching him warily. "Please, Bellamy," she said, her voice suddenly soft, maybe even a little broken. "Don't make me do this."

Bellamy swallowed. Shut his eyes for a moment as if to block out the sight of her. "I'm not. You are."

She pulled back a step, putting more space between them. But Bellamy could practically hear her thoughts, and when Octavia tried once more to split away and around, deeper across the field, Bellamy was ready. Blocking her path once more, Bellamy countered with an elbow to her ribs. She maneuvered before she could receive the full blow, and his arm glanced off her hip. She spun around and brought the small blade across his calf.

At first, Bellamy didn't register the pain. Then heat licked up his leg, coaxing a hiss of breath from him. It drew his attention just enough for Octavia to get ahead once more.

Ignoring the sting, Bellamy went after her, sweat sliding down his neck, blood racing through his veins. _No._ The thought was a scream inside him, chasing away the pain, spurring him on. He wouldn't let her do this. He _would not._

She was more nimble, but he was faster, and the moment he was close enough, Bellamy reached for her, latching onto the elbow she planned to have connect with his face.

He yanked her back so hard, she stumbled.

Octavia's quick breaths coalesced into a short scream of frustration.

Bellamy bit back the sudden rush of pain as he faced her. "If you want to get past me," he said, "you're gonna have to kill me, O."

The muscles in her jaw flexed, and she closed her eyes. Bellamy could see her hands were trembling. A moment passed until her eyes opened and she leveled them at him. They glistened with unshed tears. "I'll try to make it quick, big brother."

Steel flashed.

Bellamy fell back as the blade sliced the air in front of his chest in ribbons. He retracted quickly, letting all the instincts and training he learned on the Ring have their way. Muscle memory was a song in his blood, planting his feet firm, discerning Octavia's moves before she made them.

When she brought the blade across again, Bellamy dropped to his knees, kicking out to her with a leg. The swipe met nothing, and Bellamy felt a force slam into his shoulder. It was followed by a bite of fire, searing across his back.

Before Octavia could get in another hit, Bellamy flipped onto his stomach and pulled back, the blade hissing through the air where his head had just been.

On his knees, Bellamy's hand found a loose root and he yanked it up, letting it be the buffer between him and Octavia's advance. He let her weapon dig into the soft wood before he yanked it away and moved in closer in an attempt to disarm her.

It didn't work.

With one blow to his arm, he dropped his only defense, and Octavia suddenly stood close by him, his wrist secured in her hand, twisted around his back. Bellamy gasped as pain danced up his spine.

"Don't think you'll get me that easy," she murmured, her lips close to his ear. "I'm not weakened by venom this time."

Bellamy gritted his teeth, and reared his head back.

He felt the impact as much as he heard it. Bone hit bone, and Octavia let out a sound of surprise as Bellamy spun around, eyes meeting hers just as she fell to the ground, stunned by the blow.

Bitterness filled him, and he hesitated, torn between hoping she was okay and dreading it.

"O?"

Silence.

Anger bubbled inside, as the familiar tang of worry spread through his chest. How could he look at the sister who had become a murderer, and still see a little girl, afraid of the dark?

"O?"

Slowly, Bellamy approached her still form, trying to maintain a smart distance, as if his sister were a danger. But she was. The little girl he once had to hum lullabies to in order to keep her from crying beneath the floor had become someone capable of hurting innocent people. The reality of that turned his world on its axis. It pulled the very stars to the ground.

Bellamy dropped to a knee, letting his hand find Octavia's shoulder. "Octavia?"

It happened fast.

One moment he was leaning over her, and the next, Bellamy was being slammed into the ground, looking up and into grey eyes.

For a moment there was no air to pull in, all traces of it shoved out of him the second his back met the dirt.

Something hard bit into his neck, and Bellamy caught a flash of white. The root.

He was pinned.

The branch dug into the soft skin beneath his jaw, cutting into his airway. He gasped like a fish out of water, his chest burning.

Octavia stood above, face hard, eyes fastened on his. A tear slipped from the corner of her eye, the regret, the pain, suddenly very raw, and very real. "I'm sorry, Bel."

He tried to pull in air, searching for something he couldn't get. "If I see Mom,-" he rasped, "I'll tell her- you became someone bet-better than this."

Octavia sucked in a sharp breath, as if she were the one without air.

Rustling drew both of their attention, and a moment later- came the sound of footsteps hushing across the forest floor.

"Don't do it, Octavia."

Ice. at the sound of her familiar, young voice, Bellamy's racing blood froze over. The pain vanished. The scream of _No_ became a deafening roar, so loud he was sure anyone could hear it.

"Madi," he coughed, straining his neck up to see her.

" _What are you doing?_ "

The branch against his throat relaxed, and Bellamy had enough room to turn his head and glimpse the young girl inching toward them, dark braids swinging.

She wasn't looking at him but at Octavia, her face pale, expression resolved. "I won't let you kill Bellamy because of me."

"Madi." Bellamy felt as though he were still choking. Why had the others let her run off? Where was Clarke?

He looked from her to Octavia, coaxing his sister's attention back to him. " _O,"_ he stared at her wide-eyed, an animal caught in a trap. "O, _please!_ "

" _Please, O! You can do it!" His cheer was soft, whispered in the safety of the small apartment room, pillows piled around the front door to muffle any sound. His young hands each grasped two smaller ones, tiny fingers lost in his. "Just one step. You can do it."_

 _Blue eyes blinked up at him from under a thick curtain of dark hair, a questioning look on the little girl's face._

 _Bellamy moved his hands up and down, as if that would make her come to him. "C'mon. One step. It would make Mom happy."_

 _Her eyes dropped to the floor._

 _She looked back to her brother._

" _Don't worry," he whispered. "You won't fall. I've got you, O."_

 _She pursed her lips. Her brows furrowed, as if deep in concentration, and with great care, she lifted one small foot from the floor._

" _O,"_ Her name was a beg, everything Bellamy wanted, everything he knew, folding in around him, catching fire. His very own apocalypse. It was as if he saw Octavia standing at the edge of a cliff, arms spread wide, ready to jump.

"O," He gave a small shake of his head. " _Don't."_

Her sharp eyes nearly softened. "Tell Clarke I'm sorry."

The biting pressure of the root disappeared. Head swimming, Bellamy watched Octavia move away from him and toward Madi, the small blade grinning from her right hand.

" _Octavia, NO!"_

Time stopped.

For this one, single moment, the very air seemed to hold its breath as Bellamy staggered to his feet and launched himself forward. He caught Madi's sapphire eyes, loud with fear, and all he could think was _not her_ , not a child, not someone who reminded him so much of the young girl his sister used to be.

Octavia's gaze flashed to his a moment before he slammed into her, his arms encircling her waist as his momentum shoved her as far as possible. Even when they hit the ground, Bellamy didn't let go. Something nicked his shoulder. Stones, big and small, bit into his back, his legs. One glanced off his temple, and blackness seeped into his vision.

But he still didn't let go.

"Mad-Madi-" he could barely hear his own voice over the cacophony of ringing in his ears. "Madi, go!" he hoped the words were a shout and not just a thought. "Get out of here! Get to Clarke!"

Nothing. Bellamy forced his eyes open. When had he closed them?

"Bellamy."

His head snapped up, eyes falling to the small figure partially hidden with shadows as orange stained the sky behind her. She sounded terrified.

Bellamy blinked. "Madi, please. You-"

A sharp gasp cut him off.

With agonizing slowness, the world seemed to return to him with crystal clarity. He was aware of the pain in his body. Of the scream of his heartbeat, shuddering against his sternum. Of the raucous worry to keep a child's blood off his sister's hands.

Bellamy shook his head, his thoughts spinning, his breath shallow. Something slick coated his palms, slipping between his fingers, and he looked down to find them bright as rubies in the light of the dying sun.

Numbness swept over him as he looked from his hands to the woman lying next to him, hand splayed on the ground. Empty.

Pulling himself up, he looked over.

And suddenly, just like that, Bellamy couldn't feel anything.

Not the pain in his body. Not the scream of his heartbeat. Not the worry of a little girl. Nothing. Because in the span of a single moment, his entire world had suddenly shrunk to a picture of Octavia lying in the grass, her small blade sheathed in her chest.

 _She covered her screams with a rag, but it wasn't enough for Bellamy; he still heard it all. He had to be very close, mindful of any footsteps on the other side of the door as he held Mom's hand, letting her squeeze his fingers so hard he thought that she would break them._

" _Almost," she whispered, the word followed by another scream._

 _It was the worst one yet, and Bellamy shut his eyes because he couldn't plug his ears._

 _There was an odd, wet sound, and suddenly Mom let out a relieved breath._

 _Then the crying started._

 _Bellamy had already barricaded the front door with all their pillows, but the sound of such a small, high-pitched wail pulled his nerves taught and pried his eyes wide open. He looked to see Mom wrapping something small and pink up in a blanket, the act quickly quieting the cries._

" _Bellamy," she murmured, holding the bundle close. "Say hello to your sister." In the next moment, Mom had handed him the bundle, and Bellamy suddenly found himself looking down into a tiny face, a pair of big blue eyes looking up at him._

 _He stared, utterly captivated by this tiny life, so precious in his arms. "Wow," he breathed quietly, chancing a quick glance at Mom before returning them to the baby he cradled. "What are you going to call her?"_

 _A quiet exhale. "Why don't you choose it?"_

 _That caught him by surprise. "Me?"_

" _I don't see why not. She's your sister, your responsibility."_

 _Bellamy let out a long breath. "Okay," he murmured, thinking. It seemed an important decision. A lifelong one. "Octavia," he said quietly, and the moment he spoke it, he knew it was right, a perfect fit._

 _He glanced sideways at Mom, finding an approving smile on her lips. "I like it."_

 _Bellamy grinned, and looked back into the tiny face of his little sister. "Hi, Octavia. O. I'm your big brother," he whispered to her, and when she started to fuss again, he reached for her hand, letting her tiny fingers wrap around one of his. "Shh, it's okay. I won't let anything bad happen to you, Octavia. I promise."_

The sight was so wrong it was almost strange, and Bellamy raised a hand over his sister, suddenly petrified to touch her. "No," he mumbled, half of him understanding what the rest couldn't. He shook his head, and brushed dark hair away from her face. "Octavia?"

Her eyes found his, and another gasp racked her chest.

All of him understood then.

"No," he said again, louder. "No. Octavia, hold on. You'll be fine. Just keep looking at me."

"Bel." Her breath turned to a rasp, and she reached a hand to him.

He took it instantly, red fingers wrapping around hers. How many times had he held this hand?

He used it to coax her arm around his neck. "Hold on. I'll get you back to the others. Abby can help you." He moved her onto his lap, ready to hoist her up.

Her sudden cry of pain stopped him. "No," she ground. An order.

Bellamy's hold on her tightened. "You don't know what you're saying. It'll be fine. _You_ will be fine." He looked up to the place where Madi had been. She was still there, standing a little closer, her expression unreadable in the failing light. "Madi, I need you to go and tell Abby. Tell her-"

"Bellamy."

It was the gentleness in her voice that caught his attention more than anything. Or maybe it was resignation. "You can't- can't fix this."

" _Yes_ , I can." Because he had to. He wouldn't lose her. He couldn't. Not like this. Never like this.

She pulled her arm from his neck, until her hand found his cheek. "Tell me a st-story, Bel."

Bellamy shook his head. He glanced over to where Madi had disappeared. He didn't want to look down. Didn't want to face what was happening, because he couldn't. A world without Octavia was a world he didn't want to be a part of, even after everything.

"Bel."

He resisted the urge to close his eyes, instead settling them on hers. "Do you remember Prometheus?" he asked, his voice thick, as if he were choking again.

"You made him pretty unf-forgettable."

Bellamy nodded. "He was smart, like you. And stubborn. He never knew when to give up."

"That's what you said last time," she gasped. "You like comp-paring me to him."

"You have a lot in common."

"Even the ending?"

Bellamy paused, his hands trembling around her. He swiped a stray hair behind her ear. "It's just a story, O. It's not real."

Octavia gave him a pained expression, gasps racking her slim frame. She squeezed her eyes shut. "This is."

"Madi's getting Abby," Bellamy murmured, shoving her words away. "They'll be here soon. Just keep focusing on me."

A sad look crossed her face, her cheeks pale. Another shudder stole her breath, and her hand dropped from his face and tightened into a pained fist against his chest. "Can't. We're -we're out of time, big brother."

Bellamy was already shaking his head, casting a desperate look to the other side of the field, looking for something, anything to help. He pulled Octavia closer, until they were cocooned in their own pocket of space. "No. You're gonna be fine. Just hold on a little longer."

"Bell-amy."

He shook his head.

"Bellamy, look at m-me."

Slowly, he pulled away enough to look into her face. Her eyes searched him, as if taking him all in, memorizing everything. Then her eyes drifted from his, and settled on the fading sun, trailing purple in its wake.

"Bel."

Bellamy wrapped his hand around hers and brought it back to his face. "I'm here, O."

A light seemed to come on in her eyes, warming the cool steel to a vibrant blue. "Bel, . . ."

And then, something he hadn't seen in a long time; Octavia's smile. Real. Genuine. Young.

"I see- I see him, Bel."

Bellamy glanced in the direction she was looking, just in time to catch a flash of black as two birds played against a purple sky.

"What, O?" he asked, looking back to her.

She opened her mouth and pulled in a shallow breath. Bellamy clung to her and waited for it to pass.

It didn't.

Bellamy looked at her with unseeing eyes, trying to understand. "O?"

Silence.

"Octavia?"

The shaking in his hands grew worse, and suddenly the truth hit him, not in a single blow, but slowly, in one tiny piece that happened to hold his world.

His sister was gone.

Either Bellamy had become deaf to the noise inside him, or the whole world had simply turned off, because there was only silence as he pulled his sister closer, resting his forehead against hers. He rocked gently, still struggling to understand as a scream welled up on the inside of him.

 _Octavia is gone._

 _Octavia is dead._

 _I'm responsible._

" _I won't let anything bad happen to you, Octavia. I promise."_

And suddenly that scream tore from him, crushing the silence into a million, brilliant pieces. The sound echoed across the field and into the trees. It seemed to carry to the very sky, and chase those birds away.


	21. Against the Odds

**Hey, guys! So, this is just an idea I had. Since Madi is so keen on telling people important things, I thought it would be interesting to write a one-shot of her telling Bellamy about Clarke's updates. It might be idealized a bit, but that's okay. I personally really want him to find out about the updates, because I think they need to be revisited. (Side note: if anyone has any requests, please feel free to suggest them to me!) Thank you, and please review!**

He couldn't stop staring at the screen.

Eyestrain had set in hours ago, but Bellamy didn't look away from the scale on the computer, still measuring a signal he kept hoping would fade, blink out like a dying star.

It didn't.

He ran a hand over his face, ignoring his burning eyes.

 _If you're caught, or if you fail to bring down the eye, no one is coming to save you._

Bellamy shook his head, wishing he could drown out the phantom echoes of gunfire.

He wasn't naive; he knew how much people could change over six years. But he'd just underestimated the extent of that change, and what kind of person it left him with after. Who Octavia was now . . . Bellamy didn't know how to grasp it. He wanted to fix things, but he knew he couldn't. This was different, a something not even he could protect her from.

Bellamy pressed a hand to his neck, massaging the sudden knot of tension that had appeared there.

The sudden cry of the metal door opening rewound that knot nice and tight; he didn't want to have to deal with Octavia again. Not now. He looked over, nearly prepared to tell her as much.

The sight of blonde hair and blue eyes made him relax, and he felt his tension ebb at the sight of Clarke, Madi close behind her.

"Want some company?" she asked, as the two came inside.

Bellamy tried for a smile, turning fully in his seat to face the pair. "Not sure I'm the best person to be around right now, but it's at your own risk."

From the corner of his eye, he caught Madi' s curious gaze.

Clarke stepped forward, gesturing with a tilt of her chin to the screen. A crease appeared between her brows, knowing exactly where his mind was at."How's that going?"

Bellamy shrugged, as if the signal weren't something worth staring at for as long as he had been, but he knew the look in his eyes gave him away. "It's going. Nothing's happened yet."

Clarke nodded, like she already knew. "Echo will do it," she said, her voice confident.

"I know." He grimaced. "I just hate that she has to."

Clarke pursed her lips, eyebrows still pulled together. "She'll make it back. One thing I know about Echo is that she's stubborn. Unless that's changed over the last six years?"

That coaxed the ghost of a smile out of him. "No. Some things just don't change."

Clarke smirked, her gaze fastened on his. "You're right, they don't." She took a step forward, glancing once at Madi. There was something else she had on her mind, too. "I was wondering, would you mind keeping an eye on Madi for me? There are some . . . things I need to go check on and I'm not comfortable with leaving her alone."

Bellamy's back stiffened. "Anything wrong?"

Clarke shook her head. "No. It's just . . . It's safer."

He looked at her intently. "The other night, you were about to tell me something. Something that sounded important."

She looked at him.

He waited.

Clarke glanced at the girl once more. Her expression would be resolved if not for that line between her brows. That always gave her away. "Madi is a nightblood."

Slowly, Bellamy nodded, already well aware. "I know, I thought you-"

" _No,"_ she cut him off. "Madi is a _natural_ nightblood." The weight in her words were tangible, Asif she were entrusting him with something very precious. "That's how she survived the death wave."

Faint surprise jolted through Bellamy, but it was doused before it was barely lit. It made sense. And who were they to think Luna was the last of any nightblood anywhere? But then the rest of the pieces clicked into place, and suddenly Bellamy understood Clarke's caution.

Coldness seeped into Bellamy, and he looked back at Clarke, understanding her with perfect clarity. He knew what that was like, to do everything you could to protect someone. That had been his whole life, trying to protect a young girl who, at one point, used to be a lot like Madi.

It wasn't anymore.

"And you're worried that if anyone knew, some people might think Madi is the rightful commander?"

Clarke just looked at him, the answer clear in her eyes. "That's why you wanted to leave," he said.

She sighed. "Things have gotten . . . complicated, and since I don't want to leave Madi by herself, I'd rather have her here, with you."

Bellamy didn't need to consider anything. "Think you'll need help?"

"This _is_ helping me," she said, her voice gentle. She looked sidelong at Madi. "And I think you're the only person I know who can understand how much that means."

Something tightened in Bellamy's chest. He knew the level of trust required to give the person you cared about the most into someone else's hands. Six years may have changed a lot, but a deep part of him was relieved to know they hadn't changed that much. "She'll be right here when you get back."

The corner of Clarke's lips lifted. "Thank you." She met Madi's intent gaze, the girl's own apprehension unhidden. "I'll be back soon."

Before she could open the door, Bellamy called to her. "Clarke."

She turned to him.

"If you run into trouble, you know where to find me."

That smile returned. "I know."

* * *

Once Clarke had gone, silence descended once more. Bellamy's focus quickly returned to the screen, but a piece of it drifted away, back to the girl who had wandered to the other side of the room, inspecting the miscellany of things littering the shelves. When Bellamy glanced over at her, he found her eyes already on him, big and curious and maybe even a little wary.

"Guess you and I haven't had the chance to talk much since we got back," he said, wanting to break the silence.

Madi shrugged. "People are busy in wars."

He glanced back to the screen before returning his gaze to her. "How are you doing with all this anyway?"

"I'm worried," she answered instantly, brutally honest. "About Clarke. I did something that she wishes I hadn't."

Bellamy dropped his hands onto his knees and turned towards her.

"I . . . kind of became a part of Wonkru."

He stared at her. Unbidden, an image came to him, of her standing in the arena, scared and defenseless. "You . . . You _what_? Madi, . . . I know Wonkru is strong, but Clarke's right. If people find out about what you are and it reaches Octavia-"

"Octavia knows."

Madi had his undivided attention now. "What? Did she-?"

"I told her."

That silence descended for another moment, and Bellamy pulled back all the things he wanted to say, trying to understand. "Madi, _why_ would you tell her that?"

"I did it to protect Clarke!" she said fiercely. "If we'd gone to Shallow Valley like she'd wanted, Diyoza would've killed her and I couldn't let that happen."

At that, Bellamy tried to breathe past a fresh tightness in his chest. No more people. He wasn't losing anyone else, not Echo, not Raven, not Murphy and Emori. And not Clarke. Not again. "What did Octavia do?"

Madi ran a hand idly over a shelf. "She accepted me into the clan. I know Clarke thinks she's changed-"

"She _has_ changed, Madi," Bellamy promised, his words breaking, as they did every time with that realization. He couldn't get used to it, and she was making it incredibly hard to accept it. "She is a _not_ the person she was before."

" _You_ are. I mean, I know you've probably changed some, but Clarke still trusts you. She still needs you."

That almost made Bellamy smirk. "We're different people now. We need each other, but she doesn't need me like she needs _you_."

Madi's hand dropped from the shelf, those big eyes gentle yet penetrating. "That's not true. I know it. Like, whenever she radioed-"

"Radioed?"

"Yeah, when she tried to make contact with the Ring."

Bellamy blinked. Of course. It's something he would've done, if he'd been in her position. It frustrated him though, to wonder how close they'd come. What would it have been like to find out Clarke was alive years ago? "How long did she try?"

Suddenly Madi looked hesitant to reply, like the answer was obvious and she was only now realizing it wasn't her place to give it away, a trespasser over personal property. Part of her must have thought it was too late though, and in a voice she pitched lower, she murmured, "Every day."

Bellamy stared at her, as if unable to understand."Every _. . ._ Every _day?"_

With wide eyes, Madi nodded. "Two thousand, one hundred and ninety-nine, to be exact."

A cold draft seemed to pass through him, but it was quickly chased away by the heat of his frustration. His guilt. All that time spent believing she was dead, while she sat miles below, talking to ghosts in the stars.

Bellamy shut his eyes for a moment, trying to clear his head. When he reopened them, Madi was watching him intently. She might've been young, but that didn't mean she didn't see as much as others did. Maybe it meant she saw more.

Her confession made Bellamy want to know about those six years. He felt Clarke's reservation when he'd mentioned it last, and he hadn't pried. But he'd known there was more, a lot more, and while he would wait to talk to her about it in detail, a piece of him just wanted a bit of insight into what that time had been like for Madi, and the woman he'd buried too soon.

"How long was it," he asked, leaning forward. "Before she found you?"

Madi glanced away with a shrug of her shoulders, seemingly glad for the subject change."A few months, I think. I remember feeling alone for a long time, but I can't remember much of it. Everything was . . . the same, until the end of the world just felt like one, endless day."

Bellamy's hands tightened, a hollow feeling settling on the inside as he tried to grasp what it would be like to be isolated for months. "You're strong, to survive something like that."

"We both are," she agreed.

Bellamy smiled. "How'd you two meet?"

Madi's expression suddenly turned sheepish, her cheeks warming to pink. "I . . . kind of caught her. In one of my bear traps."

He winced internally. "Traps?"

"Yeah. And then I stole her supplies. I warmed up to her, though. Now I can't really remember what it was like without her. Like she was always there."

Bellamy nodded, understanding. That was like the day Octavia had been born. It felt like his starting point after a long time being adrift. "What about Clarke? How was she when you found her?"

Again, Madi shrugged, but Bellamy caught a flash of something in her bright blue eyes. "Quiet. Sad. I don't remember much. We haven't talked about it."

Bellamy's brows furrowed. "Ever?"

Madi pressed her lips together. "She doesn't talk about before."

That quiet crept back into the room as he took her words in, wishing he could shrug off the guilt that had begun to weigh on his shoulders. Clarke wouldn't want that, he knew. It was just one of those times he wished, more than anything, that he could've changed something by not changing anything at all. Clarke staying here didn't only save their lives, but Madi's as well. But the memory of leaving her had haunted him for years after, and it frustrated him to know that while they were surviving off algae on the ark together, Clarke was alone. Not forever, but long enough for her to never want to talk about it.

"What did she radio us about? Was it just to check in?"

Madi shook her head. "Oh no. They were mostly updates. What we were doing. What was going on. Like when we would make trips to Polis, or when the solar panel of the rover broke. Twice. A few years ago, there was a really bad sandstorm, and Clarke almost got lost." She grimaced at the memory. "Some updates were more important than others. I think she did it to feel close to you. That it made her feel like you guys were still alive."

Bellamy swallowed, once again taken aback by the picture Madi painted, of a radio stashed between the two of them, full of messages that would never reach their destination. It reminded him of a time on the Ark, when, in Earth Skills, he'd first heard about messages contained in bottles. Their words were tediously scrawled and folded onto paper, only to be capped and cast into the sea where they waited, against the odds, to be found. He thought about that now, imagining not one bottle but over two thousand of them, drowning, unanswered, in the expanse of space.

And yet, Clarke had still hoped. Six years of silence couldn't take that from her.

"I bet she had a lot of questions for Raven. Probably gave Monty an earful about the algae," Bellamy said, half joking. "Harper would've liked to hear her medical advice. I'm sure she had a lot after . . . after."

Madi rested her forearm at the edge of the table he sat at, peering sidelong at him. "Yeah, she talked about them."

Bellamy glanced up at her. " _About_ them? I thought you said she talked to them. To us."

"Not to everyone," Madi said, her expression suddenly serious, her eyes so much like Octavia's had once been. "She talked to _you."_

He stared at her, his thoughts silent. He struggled to understand, moments slipping by until finally, in a softer voice, he simply asked, "Why?"

"She says it's because it helped ground her, but I also think it's because you always understood each other. After everything with the grounders, and the Mountain Men, and ALIE . . . you were there for each other. And then after praimfaya, I think there were times when she needed you there, and the radio was as close as she could get."

At that, Bellamy understood. It had taken him months to adjust to the change on the Ring, not just to returning to space, but also to the absence of the person who seemed to understand him without words. He looked for that in other places, but it had taken a long time to find again. And even then, it wasn't the same. There were no wars on the Ring. No only choices to decide between. Something happened to those who stood side by side through all that. It built a trust between them, a deep understanding of the heart scars they were left with in the aftermath, and when one person was lost, it was felt deeply by the other.

"I wish I could've answered her," he said simply, his words feeling insufficient. He wished he could've heard her at all.

"It's okay," said Madi. She placed a gentle hand on his shoulder and gave him a small smile. "You're here now. That's all that matters."


End file.
